LIBRARY 

Y  OF  CALIFORNIA 
DAVIS 


,  ;<  f 

^i      t 


LYRICS 


BY    THE    LETTER    H 


NEW- YORK: 
J.    C.   DTCRBY,   8   PARK   PL.ACE. 

CINCINNATI  : 

H.    W.   DERBY. 

1854. 


LIBRARY 

OF  CALIFORNIA 
DAVIS 


Entered   according  to   Act  of  Congress  by  J.  C.  DERBY,  in  the  Clerk's  Office  of 

the  U.  S.  District  Court  for  the  Southern  District  of  New-York,  in  the 

year  of  our  Lord  one  thousand  eight  hundred  and  fifty-four. 


Printed  by  HOLMAN,  GRAY  &  Co..  N.  Y. 


TO 

CHARLES  GORDON  GREENE, 

OF  THE   BOSTON   POST, 

A    TRUE    MAN    AND    GOOD    FRIEND, 

Volume  te  finscrffce'D. 


CONTENTS. 

PAGE. 
THE  CHEMISETTE,  ....  7 

TIME,  ........  9 

THE  BALL  ROOM  BELLE,  ....  .11 

LABOR'S  WAR  SONG.  .  13 

A  HYMN  TO  THE  TYPES,  ......       17 

THE  FERRY-BOATS  OF  GOTHAM,  ...  23 

TOAZRA,  ....  •      25 

AX  EXILE'S  GRAVE,  ....  .30 

PASSIOX,  ...  .  .  .  .34 

FORGIVE,  .  .  .37 

THE  OLD  YEAR  AND  THE  NEW,  .  .  .       38 

THE  HOUSEHOLD  TOMB,  ...  .42 

"  A  DOLLAR  IN  HIS  POUCH,"  .  .       46 

THE  LIFE  CHASE,  47 

GAGED'AMOUR,  . 49 

A  WINTER  LYRIC,  52 

THE  MYSTIC  VOICE,  56 

THE  MIDNIGHT  WATCH,  .  ...  58 

TO  LAURA,  ...  .  .60 

THE  MOURNERS,  . 62 

THE  STARS  OF  MEMORY,  ...  .66 

A  COLLEGE  SONG,  .  .  .  70 

THE  RUBY,  .  72 

THE  CHALLENGE  CUP,          ...  75 

WEBSTER,  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .77 

MORE  LIGHT,  78 

ITALIAN  FREEDOM, 80 

A  RUSHING  MELODY, 82 

THE  RHYMER'S  RITUAL,  ...  .87 

A  BROADWAY  BELLE, 90 

A  VERY  TENDER  BALLAD,         ...  .      92 

THE  NYMPH  OF  LURLEIBERGH,  .          104 

A  WINDY  DISSERTATION,  ...  .    107 

THE  OLD  BACHELOR'S  NEW  YEAR,  .  .111 

SOME  WISDOM  IX  DOGGEREL,  .  .  .    113 

THE  OPIUM  DREAM,  .  .  .  .  .  .115 

WIDOWOLOGY  PHILOSOPHIZED,         .  ...     117 

THE  WELL-DRESSED  MAX,  .  .  .  119 

WOMAN'S  RIGHTS,  .  .  .121 

THE  ISLANDS  THAT  AWAIT  US,  ...  124 


VI. 

PAGE. 

A  CALIFORNIAN  DITTY,  ...  .     127 

IGDRASIL,  ....  .130 

THE  BACHELOR'S  ADIEU,          .  .132 

THE  CRYSTAL  PALACE,        .  .  .136 

THE  MORNING  SERENADE,        .  .     140 

ROMANCE  AND  ECHO,  .  .  .          142 

FLEUVE  DU  TAGE,  .  .  .144 

WHY  LOVE  THE  TURK  AND  HATE  THE  CZAR,  .  .          145 

DUET  FOR  THE  BREAKFAST  TABLE,  .     151 

THE  PRISONER  OF  WAR,        .  .  •          154 

MATRIMONIAL  COMPLACENCY,  .  .157 

WE  MIGHT  HAVE  BEEN, 159 

SOME  TALK  ABOUT  POETS,        ...  .160 

THE  LAST  MOSQUITO,  .  .  .          162 

SPIRIT  RAPPING,  .  165 

THE  BROKEN  HEART,  ...          167 

THE  FIRST  OF  MAY .168 

THE  LAST  RESORT,  ......          170 

THINE  EYES  OF  BLUE, .171 

THE  THRONE  AND  THE  WORKSHOP,        ....          172 

THE  LAST  APPEAL, 174 

A  PUN  GENT  CONSIDERATION 175 

NEW- YORK  CRYSTAL  PALACE,  .  .     179 

TRUTH  IN  PARENTHESIS, 185 

ORIGIN  OF  THE  HAIR  CHAIN, 187 

MAXIMS  OF  THE  NEWSPAPERS,  .  ...          189 

ADIEU, 191 

THE  CRUSADER  SONG,  .  .  .  .  .          192 

SONNETS,  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .195 

THE  BACCHANTE .  .200 

THE  MINER'S  DREAM,  .  .  .  .  .  .201 

ALAS !  THEY  MET,        ........          202 

FEMININE  ARITHMETIC,  .  .  .  .  .203 

ROMEO  AND  JULIET, 204 

THE  MUSHROOM  HUNT,  ....  .207 

THETURQUOIS, 208 

LINES, 209 

A  MAINE-LAW  LYRIC, 211 

A  PALPABLE  PARODY,  .  ....      214 

AN  OLFACTORY  ODE  IN  PRAISE  OF  NEW- YORK  CLEANLINESS,    iil5 
RIME  OF  YE  SEEDIE  PRINTEERE  MAN,        .  .  .  .218 

A  TEMPERANCE  PARODY  221 

THE  LOST  CITY  BROOM, 223 

EPIGRAM,  .  228 


cs  bj)  tjje  fetter  |\ 


THE  CHEMISETTE. 

0  Chemisette  !  the  fairest  yet 

That  e'er  hid  bosom  purer,  whiter  ! 
Thou  dost  not  know  what  envious  woe 

Thy  veiling  snow  hath  given  the  writer. 
So  trimly  frilled — so  plmnply  filled  ! 

And  then  the  eyes  that  shine  above  it ! 

1  burn — I  long — nor  is  it  wrong, 

(At  least  in  song,)  dear  girl,  to  love  it. 

Sweet  Chemisette  !  the  coral  set 

To  chain  thy  folds  in  gentle  duty, 
Flings  round  a  glow  upon  the  snow 

To  heighten  so  thy  blushing  beauty : 
And  ne'er  before,  on  sea  or  shore, 

Did  coral  feel  a  softer  billow — 
Xor  could  the  gold  around  it  rolled. 

Though  ten  times  told,  deserve  the  pillow! 


0  Chemisette  !  below  thee  met 

A-  rosy  ribbon  binds  her  bodice  : 
And  in  her  mien  is  clearly  seen 

One  half  the  queen,  and  one  the  goddess. 
Her  voice  is  low — how  sweet  its  flow  ! 

Her  upper  lip  disdains  the  under  : 
Her  curls  are  like  dark  waves  that  strike 

A  marble  cliff — then  rush  asunder. 


0  ripening  grace  !   O  radiant  face  ! 

When  love  is  love  it  knows  no  measure  ! 
Her  hands  are  small,  but  yet  can  call 

The  power  of  music  at  their  pleasure  : 
And  as  they  peep  from  sleeves  of  deep, 

White  Brussell's  lace,  "  La  mode  Ramillies," 
Her  fingers  seem,  or  else  I  dream, 

Like  stamens  in  the  bells  of  lilies. 


As  clouds  of  spring  on  feathery  wing 
Obscure  the  blushing  heaven  a  minute, 

So,  Chemisette !  thy  silvery  net 

Now  veils  the  heaven  that  glows  within  it. 


Oh,  bear  me  up  !  I  faint,  I  droop, 
My  glowing  pulses  throb  and  tingle — 

Immortal  bliss  !  but  grant  me  this, 
In  such  a  Heaven  one  hour  to  mingle ! 


TIME. 


Time  rolls  away,  and  bears  along 
A  mingled  mass  of  right  and  wrong  ; 
The  flowers  of  love  that  bloomed  beside 
The  margin  of  its  summer  tide  ; 
The  poison- weeds  of  passion,  torn 
From  dripping  banks,  and  headlong  borne 
Into  that  unhorizoned  sea 
Which  mortals  call  eternity. 

ii. 

Noiseless  and  rapid  as  a  dream, 
For  ever  flows  the  widening  stream ; 
While  every  wave,  or  transient  hour, 
Heaves  up  a  weed  and  takes  a  flower. 
2 


10 


The  isle  of  life,  that  seemed  to  be 
A  continent  infinity, 
Grows  bleaker,  narrower,  day  by  day,. 
And  channelled  by  a  salter  spray. 

in. 

Like  shipwrecked  men  who  closelier  flock 

To  the  bare  summit  of  the  rock, 

When  the  loud  storm  that  wrecked  them  flings 

A  loftier  billow  from  its  wings, — 

We  climb  from  youth's  wave-rippled  strand 

With  heavier  heart  and  feebler  hand 

Up  the  gray  rock  of  age,  whose  peak 

Time's  mounting  billows  surge  and  seek. 

IV. 

There  from  the  barren  top  espy 

A  girth  of  tears, — an  ashen  sky ; 

Bowed  heads,  cold  hearts  and  palsied  feet 

To  age's  pinnacle  retreat ; 

While  the  dull  tide  that  swells  below 

Pursues  them  with  a  sullen  flow  : 

The  rock  is  hid, — the  waves  beat  high — 

And,  lo  ! — an  ocean  and  a  sky  ! 


11 

THE  BALL-ROOM  BELLE. 

She  wore  a  satin  slipper 

A  pair  of  silvery  shoon, 
And  seemed  the  daintiest  tripper 

In  all  the  gay  saloon — 
Her  robe  of  pink  was  covered 

With  richest  Limerick  lace: 
And  sweet  good-humor  hovered 

Around  her  dimpling  face. 

Her  hair  was  brown,  or  golden, — 

It  changed  as  fell  the  light — 
Her  bodice  scarce  could  hold  in 

Her  bosom's  heaving  white : 
Her  eyes  were  gay  and  merry 

As  a  fountain  in  the  shade, 
And  her  voice  was  sweet  and  cheery 

As  the  thoughts  that  it  conveyed. 

She  bent  as  may  the  lily 

When  the  morning-breezes  glide 
Adown  the  upland  hilly 

To  the  river's  rippling  side ; 


12 


She  waltzed,  and,  as  outfloating 
Her  robes  and  ringlets  streamed, 

I  could  not  keep  from  noting 
How  fairy-like  she  seemed. 


But  when  with  heightened  color 

She  ceased  the  whirling  dance, 
A  strange  and  panting  pallor 

Came  o'er  her  countenance, 
I  asked  her — "  0,  forgive  me, — 

Can  I  serve  you  ? — nay, — I  will- 
My  fears  do  not  deceive  me, 

You  are — you  must  be  ill  ?" 


Then  she,  with  timid  glances, 

From  lips  as  sweet  as  thyme, 
Replied — "  These  eastern  dances 

111  suit  our  western  clime ; 
Could  you — it  might  relieve  me  "— 

•(I  rose  upon  the  hint) — 
"  A  glass  of  water  give  me, 

With  a  glass  of — BRANDY  IN  'x  ?' 


13 
LABOR'S  WAR  SONG, 


Up,  brethren !  up  !     The  world  is  not 

So  bad  as  some  would  make  it ; 
Although  we  till  a  stubborn  lot, 

The  plough  of  toil  can  break  it ; 
And  wheat, — a  sea  of  amber  froth, — 

White-apple  bloom,  and  blushing  cherries, 
Will  soon  replace  the  thistle  growth 

And  bitter  bramble-berries  ! — 
For  life's  a  field,  a  goodly  field, 

Where  skill  and  long  endeavor 
Can  make  the  barren  wilderness 

An  Eden  bower  for  ever  ! 


ii. 


Wherever  Reason  bids  you  go, 

Be  firm  resolved  to  follow ! 
Ne'er  build  a  house  on  Age's  snow — 

Tradition  is  but  hollow. 
With  eyes  that  never  shun  the  light, 

Although  it  show  your  past  mischances, 


14 


Ride  down  the  phantom  brood  of  night 
With  troops  of  gallant  fancies ! 

For  life's  a  fight,  a  stubborn  fight, 
Where  hope  and  fresh  endeavor 

Can  overcome  the  hosts  of  Care, 
For  ever  and  for  ever ! 


in. 

If  Anguish  hems  you  in  upon 

Some  bleak  and  lonely  mountain, 
Ne'er  sigh  for  the  forsaken  lawn, 

And  willow-shaded  fountain ; 
But,  on  the  lightning-shivered  top, 

Learn  of  the  eagle  self-reliance, 
And  let  the  whirlwinds,  as  they  drop, 

Bear  down  your  bold  defiance  ! 
For  life's  a  fight,  a  gallant  fight, 

Where  heart  and  strong  endeavor 
Shall  win  the  palm  and  wear  the  palm 

For  ever  and  for  ever ! 


IV. 

Besieged  in  Want's  despised  retreat, 
With  friends  and  funds  but  scanty, 


Fling  over  half  the  bread  you  eat, 

That  men  may  think  you've  plenty; 
'Twas  thus  the  Goth  was  driven  from  Rome ; 

And  'tis  a  maxim  broadly  Roman, — 
Though  bitter  tears  may  fall  at  home, 

Laugh  loud  before  your  foeman  ! 
For  life's  a  siege,  a  long-drawn  siege, 

A  fierce,  protracted  trial, 
Where  fate  for  ever  gives  the  palm 

To  hope  and  self-denial. 


v. 

Should  those  you  friended  in  distress 

Forget  you — 'tis  the  fashion — 
Ne'er  let  them  know  their  worthlessness 

Had  power  to  move  your  passion  ! 
Be  cool,  and  smile — the  war  of  life 

Again  may  place  you  far  above  them  ; 
And,  should  you  chance  to  meet  in  strife, 

Then,  prove  how  much  you  Jove  them  ! 
For  life's  a  fight,  a  varying  fight, 

Defeat  and  victory  blended. — • 
Though  Wrong  may  triumph  for  awhile, 

Right  wins  ere  all  is  ended  J 


16 


VI. 


Should  she  who  shared  your  summer  lot, 

Now  shun  your  cold  caresses, 
Oh,  blame  her  not ! — oh,  hurt  her  not ! 

But  loose  her  golden  jesses ; 
She  never  loved, — no  power  on  earth 

Can  change  a  woman's  true  affection ; 
Nor  is  the  haggard  falcon  worth 

A  moment's  sad  dejection. 
Forget  her  frailty  in  the  fight, 

Where  brain  and  bold  endeavor, 
Still  win  at  will  a  changeless  crown 

For  ever  and  for  ever  1 


VII. 

Avoid  the  fruitless  strife  of  creed — 

You  cannot  turn  nor  guide  it ; 
Let  Heaven  award  the  victor's  meed, 

And  Priest  with  Priest  decide  it ! 
Believe  that  life  is  fleeting  breath, 

Be  just  to  man  and  love  your  neighbor} 
And  take  this  ritual  for  your  faith, — 

"  Truth,  Temperance,  and  Labor !" 


17 


AncI  thus  the  error-clouds  that  veil 
The  heaven  of  life  will  sever, 

And  Grod's  approving  eye  look  clown 
On  Faith  and  firm  Endeavor. 


A  HYMN  TO  THE  TYPES. 


0  silent,  myriad  army,  whose  true  metal 

Ne'er  flinched  nor  blenched  before  the  despot  Wrong ! 
Ye  brethren,  linked  in  an  immortal  battle 

With  time-grown  Falsehoods,  tyrannous  and  strong  ! 
Fragments  of  strength  and  beauty  lying  idle, 

Each  in  its  place,  until  the  appointed  day, 
Then,  swift  as  wheels  the  squadron  to  the  bridle, 

Ye  spring  into  the  long  compact  array  ! 


ii. 


Obedient,  self-contained  and  self-contented, 
Like  veteran  warriors  in  the  mingled  broil, 

Each  giving  help  where  just  his  help  is  wanted, 
Nor  seeking  more  than  his  due  share  of  toil. 
2* 


Striving,  not  vainly,  each  to  be  a  leader. 
Your  capitals  are  captains  of  the  file. 

The  crown  you  aim  at,  to  inform  the  reader, 
And  help  old  Truth  on  for  another  mile  ! 


in. 


What  wondrous  dreams  of  beauty  may  be  flying, 

Unwinged7  unuttered,  through  your  silent  mass  ! 
Even  as  a  prism  in  some  deep  grotto  lying, 

Until  the  informing  soul  of  Genius  pass, 
Filling  the  cavern  with  a  light  as  tender 

As  that  which  breaks  from  Love's  half  downcast  eyes  ; 
Then  the  cold  gem  awakes  to  rainbow  splendor, 

Where,  couched  in  moss,  beside  the  fount  it  lies. 


IV. 


Oh  !  what  a  burst  of  glory  when  ye  mingle 

Your  bloodless  hands  in  the  support  of  truth  ! 
When  to  your  banded  spell  the  pulses  tingle 

Of  tottering  age  and  fiery-visioned  youth  ! 
What  power  and  strength  when  ye  stand  up  united 

Beneath  the  master-spirit's  guiding  sway! 
A  thousand  lamps  at  one  lone  altar  lighted, 

Turning  the  night  of  error  into  day  ! 


v. 

Ye  are  the  messengers  all  earth  pervading, 

Which  speak  of  comfort  and  communion  still ! 
Planks  of  a  mighty  ship,  whose  precious  lading 

Is  man's  just  reason,  and  his  heart's  fond  will. 
Launched  on  the  stream  of  time,  our  thoughts  are  drifted 

Far,  far  adown  our  children-peopled  shore, 
And  the  gay  pennon  of  our  hope  is  lifted 

When  him  it  cheered  through  life  it  cheers  no  more  ! 


VI. 

Unmarshalled  army !  earth  is  still  a  wonder, 

A  bright  God's  wonder,  all  too  little  known ! 
Star-eyes  above  us  and  the  green  sod  under, 

Oceans  of  beauty  girdling  every  zone  ! 
And  man  himself,  whose  deep  heart  throbs  for  ever 

With  passionate  longings,  and  the  fierce  unrest 
Of  hopes  that  struggle  in  a  vain  endeavor 

To  hear  themselves  by  other  lips  confest. 


VII. 

Ye  are  the  mightier  tongues  we  have  invented 
To  bear  our  utterance  ever  and  allwhere, 


Our  hearts  into  a  thousand  hearts  transplanted, 

A  multiplied  existence  ye  confer  ! 
Falsehood  with  bloodshot  eyes  awoke  from  slumber, 

And  glared  in  baleful  terror  on  your  birth, 
Meek-fronted  Truth  enrolled  you  in  her  number, 

And  cried,  "  I  am  not  without  hope  on  earth  !" 


VIII. 


Ye  are  true  types  of  men !     When  disunited, 

The  world  has  nothing  feebler  or  more  vain  ! 
But,  when  one  animating  thought  has  lighted 

The  dim  recesses  of  each  heart  and  brain, 
The  mass  rolls  onward  with  a  steady  motion, 

Warned  by  Truth's  beacon  from  the  rock  of  Death, 
The  breath  of  Knowledge  sweeps  the  stagnant  ocean, 

And  men  rise  up  like  billows  at  its  breath — 


IX. 

Rise  up  and  shake  the  beetling  cliffs  of  error, 

Pour  through  its  hollow  base  with  thund'rous  din  ! 

Shake  down  the  columns  which  have  shed  a  terror 
And  a  dark  shadow  round  the  bay,  wherein, 


Landlocked  in  God's  deep  love,  our  bark,  undamaged, 
Shimmers  among  the  countless  skiffs  that  sail 

That  "  bay  of  life"  where  heaven  and  earth  are  imaged, 
And  Nature  gleams  through  Passion's  liquid  veil ! 

x. 

Ye  are  the  swords  of  Truth — the  only  weapon 

That  Truth  should  wield  in  this  protracted  war, — 
Ye  are  the  rocks  of  Knowledge  that  we  step  on, 

In  thought's  bright  firmament,  from  star  to  star  ! 
I  see  an  angel  winged  in  every  letter, 

Even  as  man's  soul  is  hid  within  his  clay  ! 
I  see  a  prisoner  with  his  broken  fetter 

Emerging  out  of  darkness  into  day  ! 

XI. 

Unspeakable  ye  are  !     We  have  created 

A  new  existence  than  our  own  more  firm  j 
Our  life  and  hopes  into  your  life  translated 

Enjoy  a  being  that  shall  know  no  term ! 
The  ploughman's  frolic-song  still  kindles  gladness 

Within  the  heart,  though  care  has  gnawn  its  core, 
And  bright  eyes  weep  at  his  recorded  sadness 

Who  sleeps  where  pride  and  envy  sting  no  more ! 


22 


XII. 

Even  as  the  marble  block  contains  all  beauty, 

Enshrined  in  darkness  and  the  outward  husk, 
Which  the  warm  sculptor,  with  love-prompted  duty, 

Shall  make  to  shine,  through  darkness  and  through 

dusk, 
Into  the  day  of  loveliness, — ye  treasure 

All  forms  of  thought  and  song  in  your  mute  sphere, — 
Our  pen  the  chisel,  and  our  rhyme  the  measure 

By  which  we  make  the  inborn  god  appear  ! 

XIII. 

Would  that  my  heart  were  wider-tongued  and  deeper, 

Nor  moved  involved  in  cares  of  meaner  place  ! 
Then  would  I  mow  down  like  a  sturdy  reaper 

The  crop  of  thought  that  rises  from  the  case. 
Flowers  of  bright  song  and  fruits  of  mellow  reason, 

And  many  a  peeping  bud  of  infant  Truth, 
My  soul  should  garner  in  its  summer  season, 

And  steep  in  dews  of  a  perpetual  youth  ! 


XIV. 

But  ah,  mute  types !  are  ye  not  all  too  often 
Constrained  to  serve  at  some  unsolaced  toil  ? 


23 


To  harden  hearts  that  ye  would  love  to  soften, 
And  help  to  swell  where  ye  would  still  the  broil  ? 

Even  so  with  me  ! — my  dreams  of  song  are  hurried 
Like  moon-ray  flashes  through  the  drifting  storm, 

And  all  that  God  made  noble  in  me,  buried 
In  wants  I  share  in  common  with  the  worm  ! 


THE  FERRY-BOATS  OF  GOTHAM. 

The  ferry-boats  of  Gotham — 

How  gloriously  they  glide, 
With  lamps  of  red  and  lamps  of  blue 

Across  the  starless  tide  ! 
Through  long  defiles  of  blazing  light 

On  each  street-studded  shore  ; 
No  sound  to  break  the  hush  of  night, 

Except  the  paddles'  roar. 

Around  the  island  city  lie, 
Encircling  block  and  mart 


24 


Vast  ships  that  rear  against  the  sky 

A  forest-growth  of  art ; 
And  girdled  thus  with  winged  might, 

Though  now  the  wings  are  furled, 
Manhattan  is  what  Venice  was, 
•     The  Sea-Queen  of  the  world ! 

O  ferry-boats  ! — the  argosies 

That  tyrants  launched  of  yore, 
To  bring  them  gold,  and  gems,  and  spice, 

From  India's  plundered  shore, 
Ne'er  knew  a  freight  so  rich  as  this, 

That  humbly,  day  by  day, 
To  Brooklyn  homes  and  social  ease 

From  business  ye  convey. 

Let  Russia  launch  her  birds  of  prey 

Against  the  Crescent  Moon, 
And  butcher  'in  Sinope's  bay 

The  convoy  of  Batoon  ; 
Let  France  and  England,  holding  back, 

Deny  the  aid  they  swore, 
Until  the  Sea  that  once  was  Black 

Grows  red  with  Turkish  gore  ; 


25 


But  ye,  undaunted  ferry-boats  ! 

Your  pathless  course  pursue  ; 
Nor  any  nobler  navy  floats, 

Nor  manned  by  hearts  more  true  I 
Your  mission  is  to  spread  content, 

Love,  joy,  and  wealth  to  bear — 
Odds-life  !     I  HAVN'T  GOT  A  CENT 

To  PAY  MY  BLESSED  FARE  ! 


TO    AZR  A. 


We  meet  once  more.     The  early  bloom 

Of  passion  perished  in  its  pride, 
And  slumbers  in  a  foreign  tomb 

Beyond  a  dark  and  stormy  tide : 
The  young  Evangel  faded  fast 

From  its  ethereal  form  to  clay ; 
The  sea  of  anguish — but  'tis  past, 

And  we  have  met  once  more  to-day. 


26 


n. 
Thy  cheek  with  paler  tinge  imbued — 

Thine  eyes — ah  ]  where  their  mirthful  glance 
A  spirit  calmed,  but  not  subdued, 

Breathes  o'er  thy  gentle  countenance. 
Ah  me  !  how  bright,  in  olden  days, 

The  smile  that  played  on  lip  and  chin  ! 
But  now,  as  through  a  setting  haze, 

The  sun  peeps  sadly  from  within. 


in. 


Thy  voice  is  changed ;  no  more  its  tone 

From  music's  ocean  may  emerge  ; 
Thy  laugh  is'  mingled  with  a  moan, 

Thy  words  of  hope  resound  a  dirge  j 
And  ever  through  thy 'gay  discourse 

Some  thread  of  suffering  winds  along- 
A  clue  that  leads  with  mystic  force 

To  the  deep  fount  of  sadder  song. 


iv. 

Love  lives, — perhaps  in  purer  form, — 
But  ah  J  its  magic  thrills  no  more ; 


The  ship-wrecked  pilgrim  of  the  storm 
May  prize  his  chance-directed  shore ; 

But  from  its  barren  cliffs  his  eye 
Will  range  in  vain  the  circling  seas, 

And  picture  a  more  brilliant  sky, — 
A  lovelier  land,  that  once  was  his. 


v. 


Thy  hand  ! — time  was,  its  faintest  touch, 

Like  sacred  fire,  lit  up  my  frame  ! 
Those  dreams  of  youth — those  hours  had  much 

That  memory  fondly  loves  to  claim. 
I  dreamed  ; — my  soul  lay  soft  and  hushed 

As  was  the  sod  beneath  thy  feet ; 
It  gave  its  flowers,  and  they  were  crushed — 

And,  once  again,  once  more  we  meet. 


VI. 


Henceforth  the  world  may  smoother  pass, 
But  life's  bright  star  shines  cold  and  dim ; 

Though  fortune  prove  a  sea  of  glass, 
O'er  which  our  lives  uninjured  swim, — 


Far  better  were  the  storm,  the  strife 
Which  overcast  our  earlier  suns  ! 

There  is  a  record  kept  in  life 

Where  love  but  stamps  his  signet  once. 

VII. 

We  meet  once  more, — Oh,  ne'er  to  part 

While  life  and  power  to  live  remain ; 
One  great  wrench  of  the  startled  heart, 

And  it  can  feel  no  second  pain. 
No  second  pang  can  bid  me  roam, 

Like  that  first  throb  too  deep  to  bear, 
When,  standing  in  my  shattered  home, 

I  woke  from  bliss  to  face  despair. 

VIII. 

And  months — aye,  long,  unsolaced  years 

Have  found  me  reckless,  loveless,  wild — 
A  man  who  is  not,  but  appears 

The  living  jest  at  which  he  smiled. 
There  is  a  pleasure  born  of  pain, 

When  all  its  outward  signs  depart, — 
A  triumph  when  the  steadfast  brain 

Floats  calmly  o'er  the  struggling  heart. 


29 


IX. 

The  lip  that  quickest  wings  the  jest, 

Is  first  to  breathe  the  secret  sigh ; 
The  laugh  that  rings  with  freshest  zest 

But  chokes  the  floodgates  of  the  eye ; 
The  heart,  like  Egypt's  Queen  of  old, 

Ne'er  lets  its  misery  see  the  light ; 
But  o'er  the  deadly  asp  we  fold 

The  garments  of  the  gala  night. 

x. 

Forbear  thy  early  fire  to  feign, 

Nor  weep  that  I  am  colder  grown ; 
With  less  of  joy,  and  less  of  pain, 

The  heart  assumes  a  temperate  tone. 
Can  prayers  or  tears  revive  the  flowers 

Which  glowed  and  withered,  shrunk,  and  died  ? 
Can  we  recall  the  golden  hours 

Whose  waves  are  in  the  eternal  tide  ? 

XI. 

The  Hand  that  wrote  the  Persian's  fall, 

"  Weighed,  wanting,  worthless,  cast  aside," — 


30 


The  dark  hand  on  the  glittering  wall 
Was  but  the  touchstone  to  his  pride. 

Adversity — another  hand — 

Revealed  thy  falsehood,  and  my  fate  ; 

Long  years  of  sorrow,  a  strange  land ; 
And  restoration, — given  TOO  LATE  ! 


AN    EXILE'S  GKAVE. 

He  sleeps ;  and  o'er  his  humble  grave 
No  gilded  trophy  meets  the  view  : 
And  yet,  the  man  beneath  was  true, 
Just,  resolute  and  brave. 

He  paid  his  folly's  furthest  debt — 
Inurn  it  with  his  baser  part ! 
His  qualities  of  mind  and  heart 

Will  long  survive  him  yet. 

Who  blames  a  weakness  born  of  woe  ? 
The  agony  that  sought  relief 
In  that  which  can  but  deepen  grief, 
Is  not  for  them  to  know. 


31 


0  friends  !  it  is  a  bitter  thing 
To  die  alone,  in  a  wide  land — 
Without  a  friend,  without  a  hand 
Or  hope  or  help  to  bring ! 

To  know  our  bones  may  never  rest 
In  the  green  valleys  of  our  youth, — 
To  feel  that  many  a  foul  untruth 

Our  memory  may  molest ! 

He  bared  against  a  vengeful  foe, 
The  steel  to  freedom  consecrate  ; 
And  died,  the  victim  of  a  hate 

That  spares  nor  high  nor  low. 

For  there  ARE  ways  of  killing  men 
Beside  the  sword,  the  axe,  the  rope, — 
Great  hearts  will  break  when  lost  to  hope, 
And  yet  no  blood  be  seen. 

In  simplest  guise,  and  borne  by  some 
Who  knew  his  worth — his  will  to  bless — 
He  presses,  as  our  noblest  press, 

The  couch  of  Martyrdom. 


32 


Last  night  I  dreamed  I  did  attain 
The  peak  of  Heaven's  crystalline  towers, 
And  there  was  marshalling  of  powers 
Beneath  me  on  the  plain. 

In  golden  suits,  with  floating  plumes, 
The  Martyr-army  gathered  fast — 
Men  who  to  this  bright  realm  had  passed 
Out  from  earth's  prison  glooms. 

Each  rode  upon  a  golden  car, 
His  name  in  brilliants  traced  thereon ; 
But  brightly  as  the  brilliants  shone, 

The  names  were  brighter  far  ; 

Bright  with  the  glow  of  Nationhood ; 
Bright  with  historic  love  and  truth, 
And  steeped  in  the  perpetual  youth 
Of  human  gratitude ! 

And  gathering  fresh  accessions  still, 
With  cymbal-clang  and  bugle-blow, 
And  pennons  fluttering  to  and  fro, 

The  tide  swept  down  the  hill ; 


Down  to  that  gate,  whose  ample  size 
Is  studded  thick  with  worlds  and  stars — 
That  gate  whose  azure  only  bars 

This  Heaven  from  earthly  eyes. 

And  there  was  ONE  who  entered  in, 
And  bowed  in  mute  submission  down : 
"  Unworthy  I  to  wear  the  crown — 
Unworthy  by  my  sin  !" 


The  vision  passed  !     Let  him  who  ne'er 
Hath  felt  the  long-protracted  pains, 
The  life  in  death  of  prison  chains, 
Speak  lowly  and  beware ! 

Let  him  who  ne'er  was  gagged  and  torn 
From  home  and  kindred  far  away — 
Who  hath  not  steeped  from  day  to  day 
His  bread  in  tears  of  scorn  ; 

Let  him  be  mute  or  meekly  pray, 
Thus  kneeling  on  the  sainted  sod — 
"  Thy  sore  temptations  known  to  God, 

Have  washed  thy  sins  away  !" 
3 


34 


PASSION, 

Passion  suggests  its  own  discourse, 

Not  checked,  nor  helped,  by  rule  or  form  • 
It  utters  by  instinctive  force 

An  eloquence,  deep,  terse  and  warm. 
It  is  not  fanciful,  nor  strains 

For  words  or  thoughts  beyond  its  reach  ; 
The  molten  fury  of  the  veins 

Glows  through  the  lens  of  crystal  speech. 

It  grasps  and  crushes  into  mould 

Whate'er  can  serve  its  headlong  need  ; 
The  weapon  may  be  brass  or  gold, 

But  it  must  make  the  victim  bleed  ! 
Imagination's  furthest  flight 

Is  harnessed  to  its  arm-ed  wheel, 
Sunward  or  hellward — wrong  or  right — 

It  will  not  think, — it  can  but  feel ! 

'Twas  born  of  Love,  and  nursed  by  Hate — 
It  lives  in  Sorrow's  shattered  tower; 

Its  only  creed,  a  blinded  fate — 
its  only  hope,  a  shorter  hour; 


35 


Its  only  joy,  the  rugged  zest 

With  which  we  hear  the  whirlwind  rave ; 
Its  only  friend,  a  stubborn  breast ; 

Its  only  Sabbath,  in  the  grave  ! 

It  lives  in  pain — in  fierce  desire, 

Or  vain  regret  for  perished  joy ; 
Its  aspirations  have  the  fire 

Which  tortures,  but  will  not  destroy  ! 
It  is  Prometheus  bound  again 

Amid  the  elemental  strife  ; 
It  is  the  crown  and  scourge  of  men — 

The  road  to  death — the  fact  of  life  ! 

Its  joys  are  full  luxuriant  flowers, 

Though  nurtured  on  a  mouldering  root ; 
Though  watered  by  the  bitterest  showers, 

And  bearing  a  most  bitter  fruit. 
The  corpse  of  Love  emits  a  ray 

Ere  yet  the  electric  glow  has  gone  ; 
The  lurid  twilight  of  decay 

Pretends  itself  a  rising  dawn  ! 

A  star  to  swift  destruction  hurled, 
Our  planet's  changeless  orbit  crossed ; 


36 


"  Behold  !  behold  a  larger  world  ! 

It  nears  ! — it  grows — and  ah  !  'tis  lost !" 
Thus  when  man,  torn  by  Passion,  flies 

From  the  calm  round  of  centred  thought, 
He  flashes  through  the  steady  skies 

And  sinks — reduced,  obscured,  forgot ! 

0  Passion  ! — could  we  turn  aside 

Thy  diamond-lipped  and  golden  bowl — 
Avoid  the  rich  delirious  tide 

That  poisons  while  it  thrills  the  soul ! 
Could  woman's  peerless  form  convey 

Its  beauty  only  to  the  brain, 
How  many  a  cheek  were  dry  to-day 

Down  which  the  tides  of  anguish  rain  ! 

It  may  not  be  !     The  inner  fire 

Defies  reproof's  exterior  flood ; 
It  is  the  marrow  of  the  bone — 

The  surging  current  of  the  blood ! 
The  bosom  chords  that  thrill  to  sin 

Will  thrill  until  for  ever  hushed  ; 
The  heart  that  has  the  worm  within 

Must  bleed  before  that  worm  is  crushed  ! 


37 


FORGIVE. 

Judge  not  harshly  ! — 0,  remember, 

Thou  thyself  hast  need  of  ruth  ; 
And  let  mercy's  accents  temper 

Even  the  rigid  words  of  truth  ! 
Through  a  glass  with  error  clouded, 

Thou  dost  all  my  faults  behold, 
But  the  springs  are  darkly  shrouded 

Whence  the  tide  of  passion  rolled. 

Think  not  that  I  seek  to  blind  you 

To  my  folly,  to  my  shame  ; 
Think  not  that  I  hope  to  find  you 

Once  deceived,  and  still  the  same  ! 
Friendship — hope — love — all  are  forfeit, 

Trampled,  shattered,  or  decayed — 
And  for  passion's  deadly  surfeit, 

Years  of  anguish  must  be  paid. 

Yet  I  would  not  that  you  chase  me 

From  your  thoughts,  and  yet,  I  would  ! 

May  the  future  ne'er  replace  me 
In  the  niche  where  once  I  stood  ? 


38 


If  my  memory  e'er  be  painted, 
Let  it  wear  the  shape  it  wore, 

When  our  souls  were  first  acquainted 
In  the  happy  days  of  yore  ! 

Fare  thee  well !  my  days  of  pleasure 

Were  not  worth  the  sighs  they  cost ; 
Yet  the  heart  will  sadly  measure, 

What  is  gained,  with  all  it  lost ! 
Madness — pain — for  these  I  bartered 

Love  as  rich  as  yours  to  me  ; 
And  the  ship  with  promise  chartered, 

Sank  in  an  unclouded  sea  ! 


THE  OLD  YEAR  AND  THE  NEW. 

The  good  Old  Year  hath  run  his  race, 

And  his  latest  hour  draws  near ; 
The  cold  dew  shines  on  his  hoary  face, 
And  he  hobbles  along  with  a  listless  pace, 
To  his  lonely  and  snow-covered  resting-place 
In  the  northern  hemisphere. 


See,  how  his  stiff  joints  faint  and  shrink, 

As  the  cold  breeze  whistles  by ! 
He  has  a  bitter  cup  to  drink, 
As  he  watches  the  sand  in  the  hourglass  sink ; 
Standing  alone  on  the  icy  brink 

Of  the  gulf  of  eternity  3 

His  scanty  robe  is  wrapped  more  tight, 

As  the  dim  sun  dwindles  down  : 
Not  a  star  arises  to  cheer  the  night 
Of  him  whose  temple  they  onee  made  bright, 
When  crimson  roses  and  lilies  white 

Half  hid  his  golden  crown. 

He  reels, — he  slips, — no  power  at  hand 

To  check  him  from  tumbling  o^er  ! 
The  hourglass  clicks  with  its  latest  sand, 
Each  moment  falls  like  the  stroke  of  a  brand 
On  one  already  too  weak  to  stand, — 
He  falls  I — he  is  seen  no  more  J 

And  lo  ! — in  the  east  a  star  ascends, 

And  a  burst  of  music  comes ! 
A  young  lord,  followed  by  troops  of  friends, 
Down  to  the  broad  equator  wends, 


40 


While  the  star  that  travels  above  him  bends 
O'er  a  sea  of  floating  plumes. 

And  Hope  springs  up  from  the  couch  of  Care — 
Her  eyes  are  full  of  the  softest  fire ; 

A  light  burns  round  her  golden  hair, 

And  her  bosom  is  soft,,  and  O,  how  fair  ! 

As  she  clasps  the-  boy  and  presses  him  there — 
As  once  she  pressed  his  sire  1 

On  evei-y  hill  the  bonfire  glows, 

And  clarions  blend  with  the  beating  drums ; 
The  yellow  crocus  disparts  the  snows, 
And  the  river,  freed  from  its  bondage,  flows, 
While  sparrows  chirp  and  the  shrill  cock  crows — 

As  the  New  Year  hitherwarct  comes  ! 


His  glittering  mail  he-  flings  aside 

And  we  see  a  robe  of  the  brightest  green ; 
And  the  velvet-green  but  serves  to  hide 
The  crimson  vest  of  the'  richer  prider 
He  dons  in  the  brilliant  summer-tide^. 
When  he  weds  his  harvest  queen. 


41 


But  Time  rolls  on  ;  and  the  conqueror  turns 

His  wearying  feet  to  the  frozen  North. 
The  sun  each  day  more  dimly  burns, 
And  the  Mother  Earth  each  day  inurns 
Her  summer  brood,  while  the  cold  wind  spurns 
The  Victor  it  heralded  forth  I 


And  again  an  Old  Year  treads  alone 

To  the  North,  bereft  of  friends. 
He  totters  along  to  the  frozen  zone, 
With  an  icicle  in  each  marrowless  bone, 
And  the  hoarse  wind  buries  his  dying  groan 
As  another  Star  ascends. 


Then  kindly  think  of  the  dying  year, 

The  joys,  the  hopes,  and  the  love  he  nursed  ! 
Let  fall  a  tear  on  his  narrow  bier, 
For  altho'  not  perfect,  yet  much  I  fear 
That  he  was  the  best  we  shall  ever  see  here, — 
God  grant  he  may  prove  the  worst ! 


3* 


THE  HOUSEHOLD  TOMB, 


The  shafts  of  disappointment  fall 

Where  most  we  build  our  pride ; 
And  now  the  dearest  loved  of  all 

Their  little  ones  had  died  I 
The  tears  they  shed  in  silence  fejl 

Like  raindrops  through  the  gloom — 
And  unto  him  they  loved  so  well 

They  reared  this  household  tomb  ! 

ii. 

The  little  bird,  whose  tender  wing 

Grew  weak  in  winter  tide, 
Who  seemed  to  strengthen  in  the  spring, 

And  soared  in  summer's  pride, — 
Grew  fainter  as  the  autumn  fell 

On  summer's  withering  bloom, 
And  unto  him  they  loved  so  well, 

They  built  this  household  tomb  ! 

in. 

He  had  a  trick  in  sunny  hours 
To  seek  the  garden  walks, 


43 


And  pluck  from  out  the  radiant  flowers 
The  withered  buds  and  stalks  ; 

He  bore  them  in  as  if  to  tell 
That  canker  worms  consume,  — 

And  soon  to  him  they  loved  so  well  — 
They  reared  the  household  tomb  ! 


The  church  hath  massive  iron  gates, 

Six  days  'tis  cold  and  dim, 
Till  Sunday  fills  the  silken  seats 

And  the  organ  swells  the  hymn  ; 
Shall  there  a  blazoned  pillar  tell 

A  child's  so  common  doom  ? 
Ah  no  !  —  for  him  they  loved  so  well 

They  rear  a  household  tomb  ! 

v. 

On  the  mantelpiece,  so  old  and  worn, 
Where  his  childish  toys  were  laid, 

Where  the  withered  buds  he  plucked  were  borne, 
In  the  room  where  oft  he  played,  — 

An  angel  statue  sheds  a  spell 
Of  prayer  around  the  room  ; 


44 


And  the  angel  boy  they  loved  so  well 
Has  now  a  household  tomb  ! 


VI. 


0  friend  !  I've  seen  the  teardrops  shine, 
And  watched  thy  quivering  lip, 

I've  felt  thy  arm  clutch  closer  mine 

When  a  rosy  boy  did  trip 
Across  our  path ;  and  though  there  fell 

No  tear,  nor  word  of  gloom, — 

1  knew  thy  spirit  knelt  before 
That  little  household  tomb  ! 


VII. 

But,  comfort !  There's  a  higher  sphere 

Where  the  earth-lost  reunite  ! 
The  spirit  of  thy  boy  seems  near 

To  prompt  each  word  I  write : 
He  says  he  shares  the  loved  ones'  mirth 

When  they  gather  in  the  room, 
And  smiles  down  on  the  social  hearth, 

Even  from  the  household  tomb  ! 


45 
«  A  DOLLAR  IN  HIS  POUCH.' 


'Tis  pleasant  when  our  friends  are  rich 

To  meet  them  day  by  day ; 
Or  good,  or  ill — no  matter  which — 

Provided  they  can  pay. 
But  is  there  one — you  answer  not — 

Who  would,  or  could  avouch 
Esteem  for  one  who  hadn't  got 

A  dollar  in  his  pouch  ? 

ii. 

'Tis  pleasant  with  our  friends  to  dine, 

To  see  them  well  arrayed, 
To  bumper  them  in  costly  wine 

For  which  themselves  have  paid, 
To  smoke  with  them — to  drive  about — 

Share  cup,  caress  and  couch ; 
But  should  we  know  a  man  without 

A  dollar  in  his  pouch  ? 

in. 

The  bride  will  love  the  pleading  swain 
Who  has  at  his  command 


46 


A  "  brown-stone  front,"  a  goodly  train 

Of  equipage  and  land. 
But  should  his  fortune  cease  to  smile, 

E'en  Lore  away  will  slouch — 
"  Why  can't  the  creature  show  a  pile 

Of  dollars  in  his  pouch  ?" 

IV. 

On  sea,  on  shore,  they  seem  to  say 
"  He's  rich  and  can't  be  dull," 
The  gold  within  his  porte-monnaie, 

They  think,  can  fill  his  skull ; 
Let  Mammon  reign — let  Genius  rot — 

Let  Wit,  Lore,  Valor  crouch  ! 
Poor  devils  !  Have  they  any  got 

A  dollar  in  his  pouch  ? 

v. 

If  Christ  again  should  visit  earth, 

A  man  of  toil  and  care, 
Howe'er  divine — whate'er  his  worth, 

How  think  you  would  he  fare  ? 
"  Hence  with  this  vagrant !  thrust  him  out  ! 

Some  swindler  I  dare  vouch ; 
Think  you  GOD'S  son  would  come  without 

A  dollar  in  his  pouch  ?" 


47 
THE  LIFE-CHASE. 

They  started  when  the  morning  blushed 

Above  the  wave ; 
Earth,  in  its  dewy  freshness,  hushed 

As  is  the  grave  ! 
They  started,  whence  a  torrent  rushed 

Down  from  the  hill — 
And  many  a  flower  their  footprints  crushed, 

On  hurrying  still. 

A  rosy  child  (the  quarry)  tripped 

Adown  the  vale ; 
Each  dewdrop  from  the  rose  he  sipped, 

And  lily  pale — • 
Oft  in  the  limpid  stream  he  dipped 

Nor  thought  of  fear  ; 
But  merry-eyed,  and  laughing-lipped, 

Made  music  there. 

He  recked  not  that  he  was  pursued, 

So  youth  is  blind  ! 
But  mocked  the  dull  decrepitude, 

That  lagged  behind — 


48 


He  sought  the  covert  of  a  wood, 

And  loudly  laughed ! 
"  Old  Huntsman  of  the  fearful  mood, 
I  scorn  thy  shaft !" 


Nor  frowned,  nor  smiled,  the  huntsman  old, 

But  tottered  on ; 
His  eyes  were  keen,  his  hands  were  cold, 

His  visage  wan  ! 
A  drapery  of  darkness  rolled 

Around  his  form ; 
And  still  he  chased  through  wood  and  wold, 

Through  shine  and  storm  ! 


When  evening  o'er  the  mountains  came, 

The  child  grew  weak ; 
Gone  the  rich  vigor  of  his  frame, 

And  pale  his  cheek  ! 
But  the  Huntsman's  eyes  are  still  aflame 

And  deep  his  breath ! 
LIFE  is  that  Huntsman's  dying  game, 

That  Huntsman,  DEATH  ! 


49 


GAGE    D'AMOUR. 

A  simple  rosebud  once,  as  simply  given,. 
And  yet  it  led  astray, 
In  passion's  devious  way, 
Two  souls  from  heaven. 

'Twas  simply  offered — taken  without  thought ; 
But  images  arose,. 
And,  ere  the  evening's  close, 
Much  had  been  wrought 

That  absence,  time,  nor  sorrow  could  efface ; 
And  on  the  brow  of  each 
A  seal  was  set,  to  teach 
That  if  we  chase 

A  phantom  danger,  real  may  be  near, 
They  never  thought  of  thisv 
The  rosebud,  and  the  kiss, 
So  long,  so  dear, 

That  followed  it — the  simple  pledge  of  love — 
Awoke  the  wish  that  slept 
In  the  heart's  secret  crypt ; 
Nor  God  above, 


50 


Nor  man  below,  could  check  the  burning  flood 
Of  passion  sweeping  on, 
Until  all  sense  was  gone  ! 
O  treacherous  bud ! 

If  all  thy  leaves  were  multiplied  as  is 
The  sand  on  the  sea-shore, 
Our  tears  for  thee  were  more 
Than  all  of  this ! 

'Twas  offer'd — taken — and  the  thoughts  flew 
To  that  it  emblems  »oft; 
And  all  the  emotions  soft 
That  in  the  track 

Of  passion  follow,  crowded  round  them  there, 
In  the  still  eve ;  their  eyes 
Grew  full,  and  the  warm  sighs 
That  seem  to  bear 

The  very  soul  of  love  on  their  light  wings, 
Flew  from  her  parted  lips; 
Can  time — can  death  eclipse 
The  light  that  brings 


51 


The  memory  of  that  moment  back  to  each, 
With  all  its  life  of  life, 
Its  passion  and  its  strife  ? 
How  cold  is  speech! 


How  feebly,  dimly  can  our  words  express 
What  we  have  strongly  felt ! 
Not  mine  the  tongue  to  melt 
To  tenderness 


The  listener's  heart,  and  draw  the  genial  flood 
Of  pity  from  cold  fountains,  else 
These  lines  would  stir  full  many  a  puls 
O  treacherous  bud ! 


So  simple  wert  thou,  that  no  tremor  crossed 
Them  thou  didst  lead  all  silently 
Down  to  that  ever-surging  sea 
Where  all  was  lost ! 


52 


A   WINTER   LYRIC 


Comrades,  'tis  a  stormy  winter, 

And  the  snow-drift  rises  higher — 
Quick,  and  fling  a  larger  splinter 

On  the  fire ! 

Let  the  loud  wind  moaning  o'er  us — 
O'er  the  warm  and  shingled  thatch- 
Hear  our  Bacchanalian  chorus, 
Glee  and  catch  ! 


n. 


Comrades,  list  the  wintry  battle — 

See  the  white  and  hideous  gloom ! 
How  the  doors  and  windows  rattle 

In  the  room ! 
Draw  the  curtains — dice  and  drinking, 

Woman's  lip,  and  wit  refined — 

These  will  save  the  sin  of  thinking 

Heaven  unkind ! 


53 


in. 

Comrades,  'till  the  dreary  morning 

Shine  above  the  waste  of  snow, 
Let  delight,  at  prudence  scorning, 

Rule  below ! 
Fill  the  flagon — each  a  brimmer, 

Ruby  red  and  fiery  strong ! 

Blood  is  cold,  but  it  will  simmer 

Before  long ! 


IV. 

Comrades,  fill  a  deeper  flagon  ! 

See  the  golden  apples  gleam  ! 
Fruit  of  joy! — O,  slay  the  dragon 

Guarding  them ! 
Life  's  an  auction ;  please  the  palate, 

Purchase  every  costly  toy  ; 
And  'till  death  lets  fall  his  mallet, 
Bid  for  joy ! 


v. 

Comrades,  hear  the  hollow  moaning 
Of  the  tempest  o'er  the  wold ! 


54 


Earth  is  white  with  fright  and  groaning 

In  the  cold. 

Some  there  be,  perchance,  who  wander 
Shivering,  houseless,  loveless,  lone; 
These  are  thoughts  to  make  us  fonder 
Of  our  own ! 


VI. 

Clinking  glasses  !  what  surpasses 

The  rich  melody  ye  chime  ! 
How  ye  brighten,  cheer  and  lighten 

Winter  time ! 

Woman's  lip  is  ripe  and  melting 
Dearer  far  than  summer's  rose, 
For,  when  storms  around  are  pelting, 
See  !  it  glows ! 

VII. 

Woman  fairest !  Laura  dearest ! 

Love  you  not  the  whirling  storm  ? 
Let  it  mutter,  while  we  utter 

Whispers  warm ! 
Nestle  closer  !     Let  thy  tresses 

Bathe  and  shade  my  panting  heart. 


55 

Winter,  bringing  such  caresses, 
Ne'er  depart ! 

VIII. 

Friends,  brim  up  a  richer  beaker 

Than  ye  e'er  have  quaffed  before, 
For  the  storm  strikes,  bleak  and  bleaker, 

On  the  door ! 

'Till  the  lightning  cleave  the  shingle, 
And  the  snow-drift  chill  the  bowl, 
Sing,  and  drink,  and  kiss,  and  mingle 
Soul  with  soul ! 


THE  MYSTIC  VOICE. 


£arth  is  a  realm  of  ceaseless  change 
Where  forms  are  merged  in  fresher  forms, 

Ind  still  the  beautiful  and  strange 
Are  cradled  in  destructive  storms; 


56 


For  Nature's  alchemies  impart 

New  life  to  all  transmuted  things, 
And  lend  the  flesh-decaying  heart 

The  eternal  spirit's  tireless  wings. 

n. 

The  sordid  shrine,  whose  vestal  fire 

Burns  dim  within  the  grosser  frame, 
May  perish,  but  the  rays  aspire, 

And  reach  once  more  from  whence  they  came ; 
We  pass,  as  through  the  entranced  flood, 

From  Egypt's  toil  to  Canaan's  bloom, 
And  with  the  sacrifice  of  blood 

We  find  new  life  beyond  the  tomb. 

in. 

Still,  through  the  vast  and  deepening  void, 

Like  sentient  flames  the  Spirits  come, 
Eternal,  changeless,  undestroyed, 

And  speaking,  though  the  grave  be  dumb. 
Within  the  soul  their  vital  spell 

Reveals  the  fount  from  whence  it  rose, 
The  beautiful — the  terrible — 

The  strange  preamble  to  the  close  ! 


57 


IV. 

And  thou,  whose  soul  with  ardor  filled, 

Hast  seen  the  fire,  and  heard  the  voice, 
For  whom  the  future  field  is  tilled 

And  waits  the  harvest,  make  thy  choice ! 
It  lies  before  thee;  struggle — strive; 

Thou  canst  not  beat  conviction  back ; 
Weak  fugitive  from  higher  life, 

Eternal  wings  pursue  thy  track ! 

•* 
v. 

Ah,  traitor  soul  !  for  whom  in  vain 

The  veil  of  Heaven  was  drawn  aside, 
As  if  to  give  the  impassioned  brain 

An  ampler  scope,  a  steadier  guide  1 
Thou  slave  of  sense,  still  madly  hurled 

Across  the  unfruitful  waste  of  years ! 
Thou  stagnant  ship,  whose  white  sails  furled 

Rot  idly,  dropping  stagnant  tears  1 


VI. 

Awake  !     Beyond  the  impassive  grave, 
The  spheres  of  being  spread  afar, 


58: 


Circle  on  circle,  wave  on  wave, 

An  ocean,  where  each  freighted  star 

Is  as  a  bark  that  bears  alongr 

From  suffering  to  the  blissful  shorer 

The  beautiful,  the  good,  the  strong, 
Their  term  of  sad  probation  o'er. 

vir. 

Earth  dies ,'  and  Heaven  with  purer  fight 

Prepares  to  clothe  OUT  mystic  orb. 
The  Spirits  move  in  viewless  flight 

To  cheer  the  dying,  and  absorb 
The  falsehoods  which  have  mingled  ill 

And  pain  in  life's  enchanted  bowl. 
Heaven's  only  keys  are  human  Will 

A  striving  Love,  an  earnest  Soul ! 


THE  MIDNIGHT  WATCH. 

'Tis  late — but  thus  I  muse  and  read 
While  all  around  in  slumber  nod ; 

O  Night !  to  those  who  will  but  heed, 
Thou  art  the  sermon-time  of  God ! 


59 


The  house  is  hushed — the  smouldering  fire 
Burns  low  within  the  glowing  grate, 

And  one  by  one  the  lamps  expire — 
Now  let  me  meditate  ! 

The  house  is  hushed — a  fearful  calm 

That  bids  the  spirit  look  within — 
And  solitude  is  bane  or  balm, 

Proportioned  to  our  weight  of  sin ; 
The  day,  its  deeds,  our  future  hopes, 

Are  meeted  all  with  equal  weight ; 
And  Conscience  her  true  mirror  opes 

When  the  night  is  wearing  late. 

How  hushed  !     The  moaning  breeze  evokes 

A  thrill  of  terror — ghostly — dim  ! 
The  grim  clock  deals  some  fearful  strokes 

On  Time's  outspeeding  cherubim  ; 
The  muffled  Hours  with  hurrying  feet 

Still  bear  to  the  eternal  gate 
Reproachful  thoughts,  an  offering  meet 

From  those  who  meditate. 

No  sound,  save  when  the  wainscot  mouse, 
Or  crumbling  cinder  bids  us  start — 


60 


Sepulchral  silence  in  the  house, 
And  turmoil  in  the  sleepless  heart. 

0  dreams  of  youth !  ye  seem  to  creep, 
In  bodiless  vapors  from  the  grate, 

Round  one  to  whom  the  eternal  sleep 
Comes  welcome,  if  not  late. 


TO  LAURA. 

We  must  not  show  the  hidden  bower 
Where  love's  high  feasts  are  holden ; 

We  must  not  let  another  see 

The  secret  flower,  perfumed  and  golden, 

That  twinkles  on  the  shadowed  lea 
For  you  and  me, 

Dear  Laura ! 

We  must  not  show  the  priceless  gem, 

That  gleams  in  pleasure's  casket ; 
No  jealous  eye  its  light  may  see, 


61 


Lest  those  who  envy  us  should  ask  it, 
Or  question  how  it  came  to  be 
With  you  and  me, 

Dear  Laura ! 


We  must  not  show  the  hidden  spring 
Where  passion  cools  its  fever  ; 

We  must  not  let  the  slightest  sound 
Betray  our  joy,  but  be  for  ever 

Mute  as  the  woods  that  wave  around 
Our  hallowed  ground, 
My  Laura ! 

O  could  we  flee,  like  doves,  afar 

From  custom's  iron  bondage, 
To  some  rich  isle  in  the  southern  sea, 

There,  in  the  wood's  enwoven  frondage, 
With  souls  and  passions  linked,  to  be 

Unwatched,  and  free ! 

Dear  Laura  ! 

Still,  in  the  world  be  cold,  reserved, 

With  social  fetters  laden  ! 
The  humble  minstrel,  what  is  he, 


62 


To  win  the  heart  of  this  rich  maiden  ? 
But  there  are  hours — thank  heaven  there  be  ! — 
For  you  and  me, 

My  Laura ! 

I  would  not  change  my  pride  of  song 

For  all  a  prince's  treasure ; 
Not  all  the  wealth  beneath  the  sea 

Could  yield  its  lord  such  passionate  pleasure, 
As  when,  upon  the  shadowed  lea, 

I  pluck  the  golden  flower  with  thee, 
And  kiss  the  gem  which  none  may  see, 

But  you  and  me, 

My  Laura ! 


THE   MOURNERS. 

But  yesternight,  his  arms  were  braced 
With  fixed  resolve,  and  courage  high  ; 

The  sword  and  buckler,  seized  in  haste, 
With  vows  to  conquer  or  to  die. 


See !  where  his  country's  pennons  fly 
Above  the  Autumn's  trampled  waste, 

The  chosen  Chief  of  Liberty 
In  Freedom's  chosen  vanguard  placed  ! 

The  smoke  of  battle  clears  away  I 

The  host  he  led,  with  victory  crowned, 
Return  the  conquerors  of  the  day, 

And  all  is  mirth  and  gladness  round ! 

But  whence  that  wild  and  wailing  sound, 
Amid  the  shout  and  revel  gay  ? 

A  voice  as  if  from  the  profound 
Shrill-piercing  on  its  heavenward  way ! 

"  He  comes  not!     He  will  come  no  more ! 

"  Say !  lives  ha,  though  with  wounds  oppressed  ? 
"  This  dreadful  day  of  conflict  o'er, 

"  Why  miss  I  now  his  plumed  crest? 

"  O  that  I  shared  his  tranquil  rest ; 
•"  Nor  felt  the  fiery  waves  that  pour 

*•  The  tide  of  memory  through  my  breast, 
•"  Against  the  heart's  forsaken  shore ! 

*l  He  comes  not !     But  a  month  has  passed, — 
"  One  summer  moon,  since  we  were  wed  ! 


64 


"  One  winged  month  that  fled  so  fast  I 
"  It  can  not  be,  that  he  is  dead. 
"  These  racking  tortures  in  my  head — 

"  This  heart,  as  if  with  ice  oTercast — 
"  I  dream  ! — 0  God  I — He  is  not  dead- 

"  He  comes  I — My  love  returns  at  last  L" 

O  halm  of  Madness  !  kindly  given 
To  griefs  that  scorn  the  patient  tear — 

0  ye  wild  dreams  that  wing  from  Heaven 
Betwixt  our  souls  and  all  we  fear, 
Now,  hover  gently  ! — hover  here, 

Ere  life  from  its  last  pulse  be  driven  L 
Nor  let  the  fatal  truth  appear. 

That  all  she  l.>ved  from  earth  is  riven  ! 

With  trembling  step  she  seeks  the  ground 
Where  horse  and  man  together  lie — 

The  field  of  death,  with  scarce  a  sound 
Except  the  vulture's  sated  cry, 
Or  the  last  deep  expiring  sigh 

Of  shattered  manhood  ;  and  around 
She  casts  a  calm,  untroubled  eye 

O'er  many  a  corse-encumbered  mound  I 


65 


A  milk-white  steed  is  standing  there 

With  nostril  wide  and  quivering  limb  \ 
O  Madness  !  shield  her  from  despair  ! 

That  panting  steed  belonged  to  him. 

Her  lips  grow  white,  her  eyes  grow  dim, 
The  film  of  Death  they  seem  to  bear — 

And  yet,  as  through  a  garden  trim, 
She  picks  her  steps  with  dainty  carel 

She  stoops  with  slow,  unconscious  grace, 

And  gazes  vacantly  awhile 
I'pon  the  cold,  unanswering  face 

That  ne'er  met  hers  without  a  smile. 

So  sweetly  Madness  can  beguile 
The  burning  heart  of  all  its  pain ! 

So  Fancy  build  her  greenest  isle 
In  Death  and  Sorrow's  tideless  main ! 

I  see  her  pale  lips  shrink  and  quiver, 
As  they  to  his  cold  brow  are  pressed  ; 

She  calls  him  ! — and  a  dreary  shiver 
Convulses  now  her  marble  breast ! 
That  harrowing  shriek  of  deep  unrest 

Bears  forth  her  life  on  its  wide  river. 
,  Beneath  yon  old  rude  cross  they  rest, 

In  Death's  long  slumber  knit  for  ever ! 
4* 


66 


THE  STARS  OF  MEMORY. 

In  retrospection's  dream  I  see 

The  waste  of  years  that  stretch  afar 
Into  the  dim  eternity, 

With  here  and  there  a  shining  star; 
Sweet  stars  of  memory  beaming  o'er 

The  sepulchres  of  perished  Hope ; 
And  backward  turn  I  more  and  more, 

As  gloomier  paths  before  me  ope. 

I  turn  me  back  and  watch  the  sky 

Grow  ruddy  in  the  youthful  dawn ; 
I  watch  the  glorious  shadows  fly 

Across  the  lake  and  o'er  the  lawn ; 
The  evening  clouds  are  turned  to  gray, 

Though  streaked  by  many  a  crimson  bar, 
And  darkness  comes,  yet  fleets  away. 

And  leaves  behind  one  glittering  star  ! 

It  leaves, — but  not  the  star  of  morn, 
Whose  pale  beams  merge  in  fuller  lightr 

When  flowers  and  birds  seem  newly  born. 
And  freshened  by  the  dews  of  night ; 


67 


That  loveliest  star  for  ever  set, 

No  second  morrow  bids  arise ; 
And  sadly,  vainly,  we  regret 

The  lustre  that  has  left  our  skies  ! 

The  Past  was  as  an  easy  road 

That  led  us  down  a  hill  of  flowers, 
Where  every  opening  vista  showed 

But  brighter  streams  and  greener  bowers  ; 
We  reach  at  length  the  barren  plain 

Where  man  contests  the  race  of  life, 
We  join  the  struggle,  feel  the  pain, 

Yet  love  the  excitement  of  the  strife  1 

We  love  the  strife  that  makes  the  tide 

Of  passion  swell  within  the  heart ; 
Nor  deem  we,  in  our  youthful  pride, 

Ambition's  pulse  can  e'er  depart. 
We  love  it,  while  our  hearts  are  strung 

With  high  romance  and  ancient  lore ; 
We  love  it,  while  our  hopes  are  young, 

And  paint  a  brighter  scene  before. 

But,  as  we  wander  on  and  on, 
And  weary  of  the  loveless  life, 


68 


"We  turn  to  find  the  flowers  are  gone 
Ee  :eath  fie  mailed  hoofs  of  strife  ; 

We  wake  to  know  that  manhood  brings 
The  pain  that  finds  no  balm  in  tears  ; 

We  wake  to  know  that  conscience  stings  ; 
We  wake  to  mourn  the  bygone  years  ! 

The  stubborn  soul  is  loath  to  quit 

The  dream  that  it  hath  made  its  god, 
And — forced  to  own  its  misery — yet 

Pursues  the  path  it  once  hath  trod, 
Looks  round  it  with  a  careless  eye 

On  others  equally  unblest, 
And  pinions  every  struggling  sigh 

Within  the  portals  of  the  breast. 

We  wander  on — the  early  hope 

In  which,  beyond  the  sultry  plain, 
We  saw  serener  vistas  ope, 

Experience  proves  is  false  and  vain ; 
For  ever  with  a  lengthening  chain, 

For  ever  with  a  darker  pall, 
We  journey  to  the  grave  in  pain, 

And  see  our  fellow-bondsmen  fall. 


Pride  checks  the  tear,  and  with  a  frown 

Would  chase  the  phantom  Grief  away; 
The  snows  of  age  come  thickening  down, 

And  chill  and  bleaker  grows  the  way ; 
We  speak  what  we  would  fain  unsay, 

But  pride  steps  in  with  ready  art, 
And  in  a  semblance  of  the  gay 

We  veil  the  anguish  of  the  heart. 

Amid  the  gloom  we  gladly  turn, 

When  none  may  mock  our  silent  tears, 
To  where  the  stars  of  memory  burn 

Above  the  joys  of  other  years  ; 
And  Fancy  in  the  dusk  uprears 

The  radiant  forms  of  perished  worth, 
Which  we  have  borne  on  flowery  biers, 

And  laid  within  the  lap  of  earth. 

O  stars  of  memory  !"  ever  shine, 

And  brighter  as  our  joys  decay  ! 
Still  shed  3rour  influence  divine 

To  guide  us  on  our  lonely  way  ! 
Bright  stars  of  memory  !  shine  for  ever, 

Like  beacons  o'er  the  troubled  main, 
Until  in  Lethe's  tranquil  river 

We  anchor  from  the  storms  of  pain  ! 


70 


A  COLLEGE  SONG. 

Well,  the  world  goes  round  for  ever, 

Whether  we  are  sad  or  gay ; 
Floats  the  cloud  and  rolls  the  river ; 

Should  we  pine  our  lives  away  ? 

Night  usurps  the  throne  of  day, 
And,  when  morning's  lances  quiver, 

O'er  the  mountains  flies  away, 
But  returns  at  sunset  ever ! 

Earth  alternates  night  and  day, 
Grave  and  gay ! 

If  the  world  so  little  care  us, 

Why  should  we  regard  the  world  ? 
Still  its  flowery  meadows  bear  us, 

And  the  star-tent  is  unfurled. 

Even  the  stars  from  heaven  are  hurled ; 
And  the  grasp  of  death  will  tear  us 

From  the  tree  round  which  we  curled, — 
From  the  tree  of  life  will  tear  us, 

Round  which  our  affections  curled, — • 
From  the  world ! 

Comrades  !  while  the  earth  so  alters, 
Wintry  frost  and  blossom  spring, 


71 


Foolish  he  who  doubts  and  falters  ; 

Pleasure  flies  on  rapid  wing, — 

Seize  it  ere  you  feel  the  sting ! 

Bow  your  heart  to  passions'  altars, 

Let  your  soul  its  incense  fling, 
Ere  the  gilded  pagod  falters, 
Ere  you  feel  the  hidden  sting, 
Of  the  wing ! 

Comrades  !  soon  the  world  will  leave  us 
Stranded  on  the  shores  of  time  ; 

Years  of  all  our  joys  bereave  us  ; 
Age  is  like  the  serpent-slime, 
Staining  roses  in  their  prime. 

Every  day  will  deeper  grieve  us, 
Every  parting  hour  will  chime 

A  knell  for  the  sweet  hopes  that  leave  us 
Buried  in  the  by-gone  time, — 
Hear  it  chime ! 

Comrades  !  seize  the  passing  moment 
Lent  us  by  Eternity  ! 

Use  it  wisely — for  'tis  so  lent, 
As  a  drop  from  out  the  sea, 
Rolling  backward  instantly  ! 


Age  advances,  gray  and  low  bent, 
As  the  waves  of  pleasure  flee, — 

Drives  us  to  our  latest  moment, 
To  the  dread  eternity — 
To  that  vast  and  trackless  sea, 

Over  which  the  clouds  are  low  bent, 
And  uncounted  shadows  flee. 


THE    RUBY. 


[In   acknowledgment  of   a  ring  received  from  J.   T.  Trowbridge— better 
known  to  literature  and  fame  as  "Paul  Creyton."] 


Dear  Creyton !  when  the  listless  pen 

Sways  idly  in  my  wearied  fingers, 
And  round  my  throbbing  heart  and  brain 

No  ray  of  brighter  fancy  lingers, 
I  catch  the  sparkle  of  the  stone 

That  speaks  of  friendship  undecaying, 
And  straight  the  clouds  aside  are  thrown  ; 

A  fresher  light  is  round  me  playing. 


73 


ii. 

They  say,  that  talismans  of  old 

Protected  from  all  hidden  dangers  ; 
That  spirits  lay  within  the  gold, 

At  once  protectors  and  avengers. 
The  ring  yon  gave,  like  these,  may  prove 

The  bane  of  grief,  the  source  of  pleasure ; 
For  all  is  pleasing  that  can  move 

Remembrance  of  an  absent  treasure  ! 


HI. 

Like  friendship's  fire,  the  brilliant  toy, 

Deep  set  in  memory's  golden  circle, 
Throws  back  the  ruddy  beam  of  joy, 

And  in  the  dullest  night  will  sparkle. 
The  ring,  like  memory — endless  both — 

Its  warmth  from  out  my  heart  is  getting, 
And,  like  myself,  of  foreign  growth, 

Rejoices  in  a  Yankee  setting. 


IV. 

My  muse — a  woman,  and  you  know 
The  female  heart  inclines  to  jewels — • 


74 


Whene'er  she  wants  u  full  speed  "  to  go, 

Her  engine  at  the  ruby  fuels  : 
The  pistons  of  alternate  rhyme 

Move  up  and  down  with  steady  motion — 
The  train  of  thought,  defying  time, 

Speeds  on  through  earth  and  air  and  ocean  ! 

v, 

The  Koh-i-noor  in  Britain's  crown 

Is  India's  blood-mark  set  upon  her ; 
The  sapphire  clasp  of  beauty's  gown 

Perchance  was  purchased  by  dishonor  ; 
The  miser's  gold  is  dim  with  tears, 

And  rusted  thick  with  cent,  per-centage  : 
My  ring  then,  clearly,  it  appears 

O'er  these  can  claim  immense  advantage  ! 

VI. 

The  mine  wherein  the  ruby  lay, 
Was  filled  with  geologic  spirits : 

The  gnome,  you  know — as  poets  say — 
The  treasury  of  earth  inherits. 

So  friendship  lies  within  the  heart, 
Possessed  by  wild,  ideal  fancies, 


75 


'Till  favoring  fortune  tear  apart 
The  veil  with  genial  necromancies. 


VII. 


The  lips — by  Cyprian  Venus  planned — 

Convey  love's  telegraphic  greeting  ; 
But  friendship  meets  us  hand  to  hand 

To  feel  how  cither's  pulse  is  beating. 
And  on  that  hand  the  ring  I  hold, 

As  prized  as  talisman  by  dervise ; 
And  may  that  hand  be  foul  and  cold, 

When  't  is  not  warmly  at  thy  service! 


THE  CHALLENGE  CUP. 

"  Fill  hio-h  the  bowl  with  Samian  wine  !" 

O 

So  runs  the  high  old  Grecian  hymn  ; 
Give  me  a  pail  of  ocean  brine, 
And  fill  the  beaker  to  the  brim ! 


76 


Let  all  the  Nereids,  fair  and  slim, 
From  out  their  pearly  grots  advance, 

While  bright  mermaidens  lead  the  dim 
And  flickering  whirl  of  Neptune's  dance. 

On  such  an  eve  was  Venus  born, 

Where  Cypria's  shore  the  blue  tide  laves, 
And  now  the  Peris'  hands  adorn 

With  amber  buds  our  heroes'  graves; 
Call  the  Typhoon  from  those  grim  caves, 

Where  still  he  winds  his  wondrous  horn, 
Let  mirth  above  the  moonlight  waves 

Lead  from  her  couch  the  roseate  morn. 

To-night  the  ocean  cup  is  won, 

The  sway  from  Albion's  shore  hath  passed, 
The  race  of  Albion's  glory's  done — 

Wind,  Typhoon,  wind  thy  loudest  blast ! 
Come  from  your  coral  couches  fast, 

Ye  slumbering  tenants  of  the  main, 
Your  starry  shrouds  around  you  cast — 

Come  forth,  and  join  the  festal  train  ! 

Glory  to  God  !     The  stars  arise 
In  bright  effulgence  o'er  the  deep. 


77 


The  vaulted  heaven  is  full  of  eyes, 

And  tranced  and  mute  the  billows  sleep ! 

Wrapped  in  their  clouds,  our  martyrs  sweep 
In  shadowy  radiance  through  the  skies, 

And  the  wild-bounding  dolphin  leap 
Like  silvery  shafts  around  the  prize ! 

JTis  done  !  'tis  won ! — the  cup  is  ours ! 

No  blood  hath  stained  its  virgin  rim, 
No  widow's  curse  around  it  lowers, 

No  orphan's  tears  have  made  it  dim ! 
Higher  and  higher  let  the  hymn 

Ascend  from  our  wild  western  bowers, 
While  unto  Liberty  and  God 

,We  dedicate  our  future  powers ! 


WEBSTER. 

Gone !  and  the  world  may  never  hear  again 
The  grand  old  music  of  thy  wondrous  speech, 
Striking  far  deeper  than  the  mind  can  reach 

Into  the  hearts  and  purposes  of  men  ! 


78 


Gone  !  and  the  helm  that  in  thy  Roman  hand 

Drove  the  stout  vessel  through  the  blinding  storm, 
,  Scarce  to  a  feebler  guidance  will  conform, 
When    waves  beat  high,  and  ropes  break  strand  by 
strand. 


Gone  !  we  are  like  old  men  whose  infant  eyes 
Familiar  grew  with  some  vast  pyramid ; 
Even  as  we  gaze,  earth  yawns,  and  it  is  hid. 

A  long,  wide  desert  mocks  the  empty  skies  ! 


MORE    LIGHT. 

More  light — more  light — more  light ! 
This  is  the  cry  of  unhappy  humanity, 
This  is  the  prayer  of  poor  blinded  humanity, 
Groping  in  passion,  in  pain  and  inanity 
Round  the  bleak  walls  of  the  prison  of  vanity ; 
Everywhere  seeking  a  ray  of  Divinity. 
Everywhere  finding  the  terrible  Trinity  : 


79 


Darkness,  and  Dolor,  and  Doubt  inexpressible — 
Numbness,  and  Dumbness,  and  Pain  inexpressible — 
All  that  is  terrorful,  all  that  is  horrorful, 
Doubts  irrepressible,  woe  unendurable, 
Tears  that  fall  laughingly,  smiles  that  are  sorrowful ! 
Longing  and  gleams  of  superior  existences, 
Voices  that  whisper  from  infinite  distances, 
(Mystical  distances  !  soul-haunted  distances  !) 
Beauty  that  flings  back  the  folds  of  a  cerement, 
Skeletons  veiled  in  the  garments  of  merriment, 
All  that  is  exquisite,  all  that  is  wonderful, 
Earth  a  vast  Theatre,  over  and  under  full, 
Full  to  the  brim  of  discordant  existences, 
Matter  and  Spirit,  and  Powers  and  Resistances. 
Everywhere  opposites  :  Anguish  and  Levity, 
Mortal  Reality,  hoped  Immortality, 
Art  for  long  years,  and  man's  life  but  a  brevity  ! 
O,  in  this  shadowed  and  whispering  night, 
This  mystical  stage  with  its  curtain  of  night, 
Grant  us  Thy  wisdom — Thy  comfort — Thy  light — 
Grant  us  more  light — more  light ! 


80 
ITALIAN  FREEDOM. 


"  Insurrection  !  let  the  grand  word  pass  from  city  to  city,  from  town  to 
town,  from  village  to  village,  like  the  electric  current.  Arouse!  arise! 
awake  to  the  crusade  fever,  all  ye  who  have  Italian  hearts  —  Italian 
arms !" — Mazzini. 


The  hands  that  move  on  Freedom's  clock 

Already  strike  the  appointed  hour ; 
The  tocsin  sounds,  the  people  flock, 

Majestic  in  their  banded  power. 
Italia  wakes !     From  town  to  town 

The  leaders  cry,  "  To  arms !  obey  us !" 
The  Austrian  sword,  the  Papal  crown 

Keel  on  the  verge  of  chaos. 

Up,  all  who  bear  the  Latin  heart ! 

Up,  all  who  love  the  vengeful  joy ! 
Let  your  fierce  wrath,  like  lightning,  dart 

Upon  the  tyrants  and  destroy ! 
Up !  from  the  Tiber  to  the  Arve, 

Let  Insurrection's  tocsin  toll, 
While  weaponed  arms  united  carve 

A  path  for  the  free  soul ! 

Let  Austria's  cut-throat  legions  learn 
To  feel  and  fear  the  Roman  rage ! 


81 


Let  the  fierce  Pontiff's  eyes  discern 
The  dawn  of  the  millennial  age  ! 

Tell  fratricidal  France  her  hordes 
No  more  shall  bid  Italia  weep. 

Reap  a  full  harvest  with  your  swords, 
And  garner  what  you  reap  ! 

Up,  Latins !  by  the  foulest  wrongs 

That  ever  suffering  manhood  bore  ! 
By  ruffian  steel  and  priestly  thongs 

Imbued  in  patriot  gore  ! 
By  every  scaffold  through  the  land ! 

By  dungeon  vault  and  leprous  spy ! 
Up  !  up !  and  with  an  armed  hand 

Strike  down  this  living  lie ! 


No  more  be  scourged  by  priestly  cords, 

No  more  be  ruled  by  foreign  steel, 
No  more  be  robbed  by  foreign  lords, — 

Arise  ! — the  tyrants  reel. 
Expect  no  mercy,  breath  no  sigh 

In  this  last  desperate  throe  for  life; 
Let  "  Death  or  Victory  "  be  the  cry, 

And  war  untb  the  knife ! 
5 


82 


A  RUSHING  MELODY. 


THE    FEAST    OF    TURKEY    AND    A    FLOW    OF    RHYME. 


So  far  as  I  can  reason  down 

The  complex  Eastern  question, 
A  Turkey,  done  exceeding  brown, 

Would  suit  the  Czar's  digestion. 
Be  trussed  it  must  with  bayonets  first, 

And  peppered  well  with  powder ; 
Then,  sliced  out  into  provinces, 

'Twill  make  a  famous  chowder. 


ii. 


Poor  Turkey  cannot  bear  a  yoke, 
Though  turkey-eggs  bear  pullets  ; 

Nor  can  the  Sultan  see  the  joke, 
Of  making  his  eggs  bullets, 


83 


Though  he  has  got  a  hundred  wives, 

He  dearly  loves  Moll  Davia ; 
And  Galatz  is  the  kind  of  gal 

He  wouldn't  part  to  save  you. 

in. 

Though  men  shake  off  the  Russian  wiles, 

Still,  Men-shi-koff  is  great,  Sir  ! 
And  Dardan  ells  are  crooked  miles, 

Although  they  call  them  "  strait,"  Sir. 
The  Sultan  in  his  harem  sits, 

While  things  go  harum-scarum. 
He  gets  in-Sultin'  messages, 

And  cannot  choose  but  bear  'em. 


IV. 

The  Turk  appeals  to  God  and  Truth, 

But  suffers  ne'ertheless  he ; 
For  Gortschakoff,  beside  the  Pruth, 

At  Jassy,  gives  him  Jessy. 
With  Gortscha-koff  and  Menschi-koff, 

His  breast  has  got  a  stuffing, 
And  if  he  cannot  shake  them  off — 

These  coughs  will  nail  his  coffin. 


84 


v. 

The  Czar  is  clad  in  costly  furs, 
From  Vashka  and  Yakaka ; 

While  Turkey's  sole  defence  from  "  koffs" 
Is  fledschid  Ali  Pacha. 

The  Sultan  to  the  Prophet  prays— 
No  profit  comes  a-near  him ; 

And  though  his  Porte  be  called  Sublime, 
It  has  not  strength  to  cheer  him. 

VI. 

He  prays  to  Mecca,  but  he  finds 

The  mecha-nism  is  rusty  ; 
His  prayer  cannot  unlock  the  gate, 

And  so  the  Porte  grows  crusty : 
His  Viziers  put  their  visors  down, 

And  will  not  face  the  tussle  ; 
Alas !  the  faithful  Mussulmans 

Have  neither  brain  nor  muscle. 

VII. 

Dis-turbin'  hands  his  turban  touch — 
His  hookah  it  is  hooked,  Sir ; 

And  soon,  before  a  Cossack  fire, 
Will  Turkey's  goose  be  cooked,  Sir. 


85 

His  Mamelukes  to  mammy  look, 

Nor  are  for  battle  pressing ; 
His  Pashas  of  a  dozen  tails 

Have  tales  the  most  distressing. 

VIII. 

His  Dragomans  can't  drag  a  man 

To  fight — the  Turks  ain't  stupid, — 
His  Eunuchs  are  as  impotent, 

For  Mars  as  eke  for  Cupid. 
There's  not  a  man  in  his  Divan, 

In  honor's  van  will  die,  Sir ; 
Before  the  storm  that  Bruin  brews, 

The  turkey  soon  must  fly,  Sir. 

IX. 

ThougTi  England  promised  men  and  mon- 

Ey,  now  she  goes  for  snacks,  Sir, 
Preferring  Turkey  underdone, 

To  fighting  with  Cossacks,  Sir  ! 
Old  Nick  may  send  his  serfs  to  fight 

From  Kostroma  and  Kausardz, 
While  Louis  in  the  Pare  aux  Cerfs, 

Is  shooting  turkey-buzzards. 


86 


x. 

The  Cossacks  are  a  savage  horde, 

But  Turks  with  them  can  cope  ill ; 
St.  Petersburg  obeys  the  sword, 

Not  so  Constantinople. 
The  Turks  are  called  to  daily  prayer 

From  minaret  and  steeple, 
So  well-informed  they  are,  they're  called 

The  constant  "/know"  people. 


XI. 

The  Sea  of  Marmora  is  small, 

A  sea-ton  in  the  neck,  Sir. 
Which  joins  the  European  head 

Unto  the  Asian  wreck,  Sir  ; 
The  Turk,  I  fear,  must  cross  it  Boon, 

To  mar  more  utter  ruin, 
And  this  is  all  I  know  about 

The  tempest  that  is  Bruin. 

XII. 

The  Turks  gave  shelter  to  Kossuth — 
For  this  esteemed  their  souls  are  ; 


87 


May  they  ne'er  know  a  Hungary  day 
Partitioned  as  the  Poles  are  ! 

May  Allah  and  the  Christian's  God 
Confound  unchristian  Czars,  Sir, 

And  may  the  Crescent  moon  be  girt 
With  bright  Columbian  stars,  Sir  ! 


THE   RHYMER'S   RITUAL. 


Of  all  the  kinds  of  snobbish  rhyme 
That  fail  to  please  or  tickle  us, 
The  worst  and  most  ridiculous 
Is  when  young  bards  be-trickle  us 

With  "  tears  "  they  shed  "  in  early  time." 

The  poet's  task,  when  understood, 

Is  not  with  pain  to  fetter  us, 

And  dolefully  be-letter  us ; 

It  is  to  touch  and  better  us 
With  gl  in  tings  of  a  gentler  mood. 


88 


What  cares  a  steam-electric  age 

For  narratives  Byronieal  ? 

It  rather  loves  to  chronicle 

A  witty  thing  laconical, 
Flung  lightly  down  upon  the  page. 

We  all  have  griefs  enough  to  spare 
Without  a  man  inditing  rem 
And  metrically  writing  'ein — 
The  wiser  plan  is  slighting  7em, 

A  hearty  laugh  can  conquer  care. 

A  grain  of  Burns  is  worth  a  mint 
Of  Byron's  dolorosity. 
Tom  Hood's  immense  jocosity 
Beats  Milton's  ponderosity. 

True  wit  has  always  wisdom  in  't. 

Long  since,  an  inexperienced  fool, 
I  loved  the  hyperbolical — 
The  Sue-Dumas-Sand-Gaulical 
Creations  melancholic al — 

The  writings  of  the  "  thrilling  school." 

'Tis  strange  that  while  of  real  grief 
We  all  have  such  immensities, 
Men  still  should  have  propensities 
For  reading  wild  intensities 

Of  agonies  beyond  belief. 


89 


For  me,  I  will  not  read  the  stuff 
Of  German  tales — too  deep  a  bit,- 
That  will  not  let  me  sleep  a  bit. 
If  e'er  I  want  to  weep  a  bit 

My  life  is  tragical  enough. 

Let  every  male  and  female  bard 
Write  merrily  if  possible, 
Or  make  pretensions  plausible 
To  that  which  may  be  causable 

Of  smiling  readers — 'tis  not  hard. 

The  lightest  pleasaunce  of  the  mind 
Outweighs  its  deepest  polity ; 
Whate'er  awakens  jollity 
Can  ne'er  be  deemed  frivolity 

By  those  who  are  not  wilful-blind. 

I'd  rather  think  the  lines  I  penned 
Made  one  hour  pass  more  cheerily, 
More  lightly  and  less  wearily, 
Than  know  that  readers  drearily 

Went  blubbering  on  from  end  to  end. 
5* 


90 
A  BROADWAY  BELLE. 

I  saw  her  in  the  window, 

She  was  fairest  of  the  fair ; 
I  thought  it  were  no  sin  to 

Kneel  down  before  her  there. 
Her  dress  was  brightest,  fullest. 

That  e'er  by  zone  was  bound ; 
And  her  fan — it  was  the  coolest 

That  e'er  shed  fragrance  round. 

She  turned  around — but  slowly, 

With  a  cold,  unfeeling  grace. 
Although  a  hundred  lowly 

Adored  her  radiant  face. 
Her  hair  might  claim  the  far  a- 

Doration  of  the  world, 
With  its  gold  and  pearl  tiara 

Above  her  ringlets  curled. 

There  were  brilliant  toys  around  her 

Of  velvet  and  of  silk, 
As  fair  as  those  which  bound  her 

White  shoulders — white  as  milk, 


91 


Her  eyes  were  bright,  but  rayless, 
They  lacked  the  vital  spark, — 

And  lovely — could  I  say  less  ? 
The  mind — the  soul  was  dark  ! 

"  O  loveliest  of  the  gentle 

And  fair !" — I  did  repeat — 
"  Behold  me  !     I  have  bent  all 

My  passions  to  thy  feet ! 
Grant, — and  the  boon  entrances 

Your  poet — lover — slave, 
'One  of  your  kindly  glances 

To  cheer  me  toward  my  grave  !" 

Thus  wrapt  in  love  and  wonder 

I  stood  before  the  shrine, 
When  a  voice  like  summer  thunder 

Disturbed  this  trance  of  mine  : 
It  cried — "  Are  you  astonished 

That  the  girl  expression  lacks  ? 
Henceforward  be  admonished — 

Your  idol  is  of  wax  !" 


92 


A  VERY  TENDER  BALLAD, 

AND  ALL  TOO   TRUE. 

Of  Sarah  Brown  and  Geordie  Mairs, 

The  love  I  will  relate ; 
The  saddest  history  is  theirs, 

That  has  been  writ  of  late. 

Of  Greordie  Mairs  and  Sarah  Brown 

I  sing  the  mournful  fate  ; 
Ye  lovers,  list,  in  field  and  town, 

And  profit  ere  too  late  ! 

PART    FIRST. 

In  Morristown  lived  Sarah  Brown, 

A  maid  of  scant  sixteen  -, 
And  Greordie  Mairs  his  witching  airs 

Her  youthful  heart  did  win. 

But  Mr.  Brown  did  grimly  frown — 
Old  fathers  are  such  bears — 

Upon  the  love  of  Sarah  Brown 
For  sprightly  Master  Mairs, 


93 

And  then  the  couple  did  revolve, 

A  scheme  to  cheat  the  sire, 
For  it  was  Geordie's  firm  resolve 

To  win  her  or  expire. 

From  Morristown  with  Sarah  Brown, 

Young  Geordie  did  elope, 
And  for  to  pass  to  Worcester,  Mass., 

And  wed  it  was  his  hope. 

They  came  away  at  break  of  day, 

Did  George  and  Sally  Brown  ; 
They  blessed  their  stars  and  took  the  cars 

For  Gotham's  mighty  town. 

And  in  the  city's  sordid  throng, 

Its  pomp,  and  pride,  and  pain, 
They  moved,  like  an  unwritten  song 

Within  the  poet's  brain. 

Through  groaning  street  and  glittering  mart 

They  moved  as  in  a  dream — 
Twin-Siamesians  of  the  heart, 

Two  stars  with  blended  beam. 


94 


The  waves  of  life  that  surged  on  high, 
But  rocked  the  skiff  of  love  ; 

It  flew  betwixt  the  sea  and  sky 
With  the  white  wings  of  a  dove. 

It  bore  them  on  by  Passion  isles, 

Exempt  from  human  ills  ; 
It  drifted  down  through  green  defiles 

Of  myrtle-covered  hills. 

It  slept  on  memory's  waveless  mere, 
And,  looking  down,  they  saw 

Two  smiling  faces  drawing  near, 
As  theirs  did  nearer  draw. 

Oh  !  woe  is  me  for  Geordie  Mairs  ! 

For  Sally  Brown  I  weep  ! 
They  do  engross  my  muse's  cares, 

And  bar  mine  eyes  of  sleep. 

Oh  !  woe  is  me  for  Sally  Brown, 
And  Geordie  Mairs  her  mate  ! — 

Why  linger  they  in  Gotham  town, 
While  "  the  Goth  is  at  the  gate  ?" 


95 


PART    SECOND. 

O,  fierce  the  frown  of  Mr.  Brown, 

As  breakfast  hour  drew  near, 
And  yet  no  Sally  brought  his  gown, 

Nor  plumped  his  easy  chair. 

A  rougher  wrinkle  scarred  his  brow 

As  breakfast  hour  drew  near, 
And  yet  no  slippers  waited  now, 

Nor  daughter  did  appear. 

"  Ho  !  Sally,  come  ! — what  ails  the  girl, 

Or  is  she  sick  or  dead  ? 
By  holy  heaven  !  'tis  nearly  seven, 

And  not  yet  breakfasted  ! 

"  What,  Sarah  !  Ho  !  Run  up,  and  call 

The  sluttish  vixen  down  !" — 
So  said,  unto  her  brother  Paul, 

The  senior  Mister  Brown. 

Full  lightly  Paul  did  mount  the  stairs, 
And  searched  in  every  cranny ; 

"  I'll  bet  she's  gone  with  Geordie  Mairs — 
As  good  a  match  as  any  ! 


96 


"  Last  '  Fourth' — let's  see — he  gave  a  V, 

And  New- Year's  Day  a  Ten  ; 
c  Thanksgiving,'  too,  I  got  a  Three, 

And  on  my  birthday  One." 

So  pondered  Paul,  remembering  all 

The  heaps  of  cash  and  cake 
Which  Greordie  Mairs  had  given  to  him, 

For  his  sweet  sister's  sake. 

"  She's  gone,  I  swow !  I've  hunted  through 

The  rooms  from  last  to  first, 
And  here's  a  note  addressed  to  you, 

'Twill  tell  the  best  or  worst !" 

The  hand  that  swayed  the  pen  was  light, 

The  ink  was  radiant  blue. 
'Twas  traced  upon  a  sheet  of  white, 

As  if  her  soul  looked  through — 

As  if  her  radiant  eyes  outshook, 

Upon  her  pallid  cheek, 
The  rays  of  that  inquiring  look 

She  did  not  dare  to  speak. 


97 


"  0  father,  dear !  how  much  I  fear 
To  draw  your  curses  down  ! 

'Tis  pain  to  live,  till  you  forgive, 
And  bless  your  Sally Brown." 

"  O  father,  dear  !  but  see  !  a  tear 
My  maiden  name  doth  blot, 

So  let  me  be  forgiven  of  thee, 
And  be  my  fault  forgot. 

"  I  cannot  love  but  Geordie  Mairs ; 

Yet  you  would  have  me  wed 
Old  Asa  Parr !     Twere  better  far, 

Your  Sally  Brown  were  dead ! 

"  O  sweeter  far  if  daisy  turf, 
Grew  o'er  your  Sally's  sleep, 

Or,  down  below  the  dirging  surf, 
She  slumbered  in  the  deep  ! 

"  Sweeter  that  worms  upon  me  fed, 
While  the  black  earth  pressed  above, 

Than  live  to  share  a  hated  bed, 
And  loathe  a  husband's  love. 


98 


"  0  father  !  turn  to  the  grassy  mound, 
Where  my  sainted  mother  lies, 

With  meadow-sweet  at  her  silent  feet, 
And  violets  o'er  her  eyes  ; 

u  0,  kindly  look  on  her  blossomed  grave, 
My  hands  have  trimmed  it  fresh, 

And  let  her  guardian  spirit  save 
The  daughter  of  her  flesh  ! 

"  Forgive  me  !  would  you  not  repine, 

To  see  me  waste  away, 
Still  paling  in  the  heart's  decline, 

And  wasting  day  by  day  ? 

"  You  would,  you  would  !  and  tho'  I  know 
'Tis  wrong  to  thwart  your  will, 

The  highest  duties  here  below 
Have  higher  duties  still. 

"  E'en  though  a  father  order  me, 

I  may  not  swear  above, 
To  love  the  man  I  most  abhor, 

And  hate  the  man  I  love. 


"  So  now  I  go  with  Geordie  Mairs, 

To  be  his  faithful  wife, 
To  worship  him  and  cling  to  him, 

As  she  to  you  in  life. 

"  0,  could  you  know  what  bosom  ties, 
The  suit  you  urged  has  riven, 

You  would  relent,  and  exercise 
The  quality  of  heaven. 

"  Forgiveness  for  an  erring  child ; 

Ah  me  !  I  dread  your  frown ; 
Your  smile  can  bless  with  happiness, 

Your  George  and  Sarah  Brown  !" 


PART    THIRD. 

A  wrathy  man  the  father  grew, 
And  fiercely  did  he  ramp ; 

"  By  heaven  !  the  hussy  yet  shall  rue, 
That  she  vamosed  the  camp. 

"  I  will  not  eat,  I  will  not  tire, 

Until  I  bring  her  back; 
I'll  put  the  telegraphic  wire, 

And  sheriff  on  her  track  ! 


100 

"  I'll  kill  her  if  she  be  his  wife, 

I'll  kill  her  husband  too — 
I'll  take  a  cowhide  for  the  priest 

And  clerk,  and  put  them  through. 

"•  My  hat  and  cane  !     By  death  and  birth ! 

The  jade  shall  learn  her  duty ; 
I'll  teach  her  there  are  things  on  earth 

More  dear  than  dreams  of  beauty. 

"  What !  run  away,  at  break  of  day, 

From  such-  a  loving  father ! 
Elope,  and  ask  me  to  forgive  ! 

'Tis  cool — refreshing — rather." 

He  seized  his  hat  and  crushed  it  flat 

Upon  his  wrinkled  brow  ; 
He  seized  his  cane  which  bent  amain 

Beneath  his  pressure  now. 

He  seized  his  coat  and  struggled  hard, 

Until  he  squeezed  it  on, 
Then  down  the  steps  and  through  the  yard 

Old  Mister  Brown  has  gone. 


101 

O  ye,  who  now  in  Gotham  seem 

To  taste  the  promised  bliss, 
Why  did  no  bird  or  fairy  dream 

Acquaint  your  souls  of  this  ? 

O,  why  no  hovering  angel's  lip 
Forebode  the  coming  doom  ? 

O,  why  should  Love  so  harshly  nip 
His  first-begotten  bloom  ? 

0  Geordie  Mairs,  descend  the  stairs, 
And  quickly  leave  the  town ; 

Right  quickly  pass  to  Worcester,  Mass., 
Or  lose  your  Sally  Brown. 


Swift  as  the  bolt  the  Thunderer  flings, 
The  father  on  them  sweeps  ; 

Revenge  still  flies  on  lightning  wings, 
While  Love,  soft  dallying,  creeps. 

Yea  !  Mr.  Brown  arrived  in  town, 

To  mar  the  lovers'  peace  ; 
He  published  an  advertisement, 

And  started  the  police. 


102 

And  he  described  them  inch  by  inch, 

The  dress  that  either  wears, 
The  cherry  gown  of  Sally  Brown, 

The  vest  of  Geordie  Mairs. 

A  crimson  vest  bechained  with  gold, 

A  Kossuth  hat  and  feather, 
An  olive  coat,  surprising  pants, 

And  a  crimson  tie  together. 

PART  FOURTH. 

'Tis  four  P.  M.,  on  Courtlandt  pier, 

And  porters  bellow  loud, 
While  newsboys  rush  distractedly 

Through  the  distracted  crowd. 

The  Worcester  line  is  bound  to  start 

At  four,  from  Gotham  town, 
And  thither  with  a  beating  heart 

Go  George  and  Sally  Brown. 

"  I  wish  to  pass  to  Worcester,  Mass.," 
Said  George,  and  gave  a  Five ; 

The  clerk  replied,  "  Your  change — 'tis  late 
You'd  better  look  alive. 


103 

How  could  he  be  alive,  I  say, 
When  nearly  dead  with  fright  ? 

For  as  he  stepped  upon  the  plank, 
Brown,  senior,  met  his  sight. 

As  Homer  wrapped  the  wrangling  gods 

In  clouds  of  sable  hue, 
Defying  even  a  Yankee  stare 

To  pierce  the  curtain  through ; 

So  on  the  luckless  loving  pair, 

The  father  and  the  crowd, 
I  turn  a  rhyming  cuttle-fish, 

And  raise  an  inky  cloud. 

But  through  the  cloud  and  from  the  crowd, 

We  heard  a  voice  of  moan ; 
The  father's  curses,  long  and  loud, 

And  Geordie's  pleading  tone. 

A  silver  voice  is  pleading,  too, 

Alas  !  to  deafest  ears  ; 
The  "  stars  "  of  the  policemen  heed 

No  "  music  of  the  spheres." 


104 

And  ladies  who  are  passengers 

Are  taking  Sally's  part ; 
But  all  in  vain — no  power  can  gain 

The  father's  flinty  heart. 

0  Love  !  for  ever  claiming  souls 
To  worship  at  your  shrine ; 

Among  your  host  of  martyrs  write 
This  loving  pair  of  mine  ! 

Among  your  noblest  martyr  band, 
Who  bore  misfortune's  frown, 

Inscribe  in  memory's  roundest  hand, 
"  G.  Mairs,"  and  "  Sarah  Brown." 


"  THE  NYMPH  OF  LURLEIBERGH." 


In  Lurleibergh's  deep- shadowed  vale, 
Where  all  the  Rhine's  blue  waters  meet, 

A  maiden  sat,  as  fair  and  pale 
As  were  the  lilies  at  her  feet, 


105 


Her  hair  in  wild  profusion  flowing 

From  roses  vainly  wreathed  above, 
To  hide  the  gentle  bosom,  glowing 

With  mingled  thoughts  of  fear  and  love ! 
O  Nymph  of  Lurleiburgh  !  thy  lute, 
Why  stands  it  thus  untouched  and  mute  ? 
What  pensive  shadows  cloud  thine  eye, 
And  cheat  the  moments  as  they  fly  ? 
Thou  art  too  young,  too  fair  for  pain 
To  dim  the  smile  and  thrill  the  brain, 
Too  pure  thou  seem'st  for  thought  of  ill, 
Yet  sad  thou  art  and  pensive  still  I 

IL 

Yea,  thou  art  sad ;  although  no  tear 

Bedews  thy  silken-fringed  lid, 
And  all  the  more  will  sorrow  sear 

When  thus  in  mute  endurance  hid  : 
Thine  eyes  are  fixed  upon  the  river, 

As  past  thy  feet  its  waters  roll, 
And,  wild  as  are  its  billows,  quiver 

The  tides  of  passion  in  thy  soul ! 

O  Nymph  of  Lurleibergh  !  the  crown 

Of  flowers  you  wear  will  wither  soon  ! 

The  lute's  harmonious  chord  will  skck, 

6 


106 


And  youth — once  flown — comes  never  back ; 
The  gushing  waters  pure  and  sweet, 
That  pour  their  tribute  to  thy  feet, 
Soon  pass  the  bowers  of  trellised  vine, 
And  perish  in  the  stormy  brine  ! 


in. 


We  should  not  waste  in  tears  the  hours 

Of  youth,  that  all  too  fleetly  flow  ; 
In  spring,  the  fields  are  decked  with  flowers 

And  wintry  age  is  capped  with  snow ; 
And  thou  art  in  the  spring  of  being, 

And  thou  should'st  be  as  light  and  gay 
As  is  the  lark  when  upward  fleeing 

To  bathe  his  pinions  in  the  ray 
That  calls  the  bluebell  from  the  meadow, 
And  steeps  the  hill  in  sultry  shadow, — 
That  bathes  the  morning  lake  in  fire, 
And  tips  with  gold  the  village  spire. 
I  too  have  felt  the  hopeless  void 
Of  pleasures  lost  when  most  enjoyed, 
And  learned,  alas  I  that  tears  are  vain 
To  wash  such  memories  from  the  brain. 


107 

A  WINDY  DISSERTATION. 

Two  breezes  in  the  forest  met, 

A  little  way  from  town ; 
The  one  was  blowing  up  to  it, 

The  other  blowing  down  : 
They  whispered  kindly  through  the  trees, 

Through  foliage,  branch,  and  fork, 
And  that  one  was  a  country  breeze, 

And  this  was  from  New- York. 

They  tossed  the  crimson  leaves  about, 

And  whirling  danced  around; 
They  laughed  to  see  the  forest  rout 

Fall  eddying  to  the  ground ; 
To  shaking  nests  and  stripping  boughs 

And  such  like  sports  they  fell, 
Till,  tired  at  last,  one  said,  "  Suppose 

What  each  has  seen  we  tell !" 

The  country  breeze — the  sweeter  far — 

Full  pleasantly  replied, 
"  I've  driven  upon  my  cloudy  car 

O'er  landscapes  fair  and  wide. 


108 

I've  seen  the  harvest  gathered  home 

By  ruddy  men  and  maids  ; 
I've  cooled  me  in  the  cataract's  foam 

And  slept  in  quiet  glades. 

"  But  most  of  all  I  loved  to  force 

My  way  through  those  old  woods, 
Upon  whose  murmurs,  warm  and  hoarse, 

No  human  voice  intrudes ; 
'Tis  pleasant,  too,  to  breast  the  top 

Of  yonder  snow-clad  hills, 
Then  down  into  the  valleys  drop 

And  chase  the  flying  rills. 

"  O'er  lakes  that  slumbered  in  the  sun 

Like  mirrors  broad  and  bright, 
My  path  has  been  a  pleasant  one 

Of  perfume  and  of  light. 
And  now  I  seek  the  city — there, 

I  hear,  are  glorious  things — 
Come,  tell  to  me,  my  sister  fair, 

Where  you  have  spread  your  wings  ?" 

So  loudly  then  the  other  sighed 
She  made  the  branches  sway ; 


109 

The  squirrel,  perching  overhead, 

Affrighted  leaped  away. 
"  O  sister  !  blest  hath  been  your  lot ; 

Far  different  mine  hath  been ! 
Now  hear  my  tale,  and  you  will  not 

Desert  the  forest  green. 

"  Condemned  by  fate,  I  wandered  round 

Yon  pile  of  smoky  brick  ; 
And  men  and  mud  were  all  I  found, 

And  both  have  made  me  sick  : 
The  towering  chimneys  volumed  forth 

A  putrid  cloud  above ; 
And,  looked  I  south,  east,  west,  or  north, 

I  saw  not  aught  to  love. 

"  I  fanned  the  cheek  of  brilliant  girls, 

And  kissed  away — their  paint ! 
I  danced  through  many  a  dandy's  curls 

And  caught  this  oily  taint. 
From  offal  piles  and  filthy  streets 

One  reeking  stench  arose ; 
And,  mingling  with  these  city  sweets, 

The  sound  of  shrieks  and  blows. 


110 

"  From  every  corner  hideous  men 

Reeled  out  as  they  were  thrust, 
Their  moutf  s  afire  with  rum  and  gin, 

With  blasphemy  and  lust. 
I  heard  the  wife's  expiring  shriek 

As  the  wretch  drove  home  the  knife, 
And  saw  some  things  I  dare  not  speak 

In  yonder  city's  life." 

The  country  breeze  would  hear  no  more — 

Away  the  sisters  fled  : 
The  wood  shook  down  on  each  a  crown 

Of  foliage,  brown  and  red. 
And  now  round  some  primeval  lake, 

O'er  hills  and  pastures  bare, 
Their  freshening  flight  those  breezes  take — 

Would  I  were  with  them  there ! 


Ill 


THE  OLD  BACHELOR'S  NEW  YEAR. 

Oh,  the  Spring  hath  less  of  brightness 

Every  year, 
And  the  snow  a  ghastlier  whiteness 

Every  year ; 

Nor  do  Summer  blossoms  quicken, 
Nor  does  Autumn's  fruitage  thicken 
As  it  did — the  seasons  sicken 

Every  year, 

It  is  growing  cold  and  colder 

Every  year, 
And  I  feel  that  I  am  older 

Every  year ; 

And  my  limbs  are  less  elastic, 
And  my  fancy  not  so  plastic, 
Yea,  my  habits  grow  monastic 

Every  year. 

'Tis  becoming  bleak  and  bleaker 

Every  year, 
And  my  hopes  are  waxing  weaker 

Every  year ; 
Care  I  now  for  merry  dancing, 


112 

Or  for  eyes  with  passion  glancing  f 
Love  is  less  and  less  entrancing 
Every  year. 

O  the  days  that  I  have  squandered 

Every  year, 
And  the  friendships  rudely  sundered 

Every  year  I 

Of  the  ties  that  might  have  twined!  B*CP 
Until  time  to  death  resigned  me, 
My  infirmities  remind  me 

Every  year. 

Sad  and  sad  to  look  before  us 

Every  year, 
With  a  heavier  shadow  o'er  us 

Every  year  1 

To  behold  each  blossom  faded, 
And  to  know  we  might  have  made  It 
An  immortal  garland  braided 

Bound  the  year. 

Many  a  spectral-beckoning  finger,, 

Year  by  year, 
Chides  me  that  so  long  I  linger, 

Year  by  year ; 


113 


Every  early  comrade  sleeping 
In  the  churchyard,  whither,  weeping, 
I,  alone  unwept,  am  creeping, 
Year  by  year. 


SOME  WISDOM  IN  DOGGEREL. 

-« 

We  know  not  why  nor  how  it  is, 

Yet  find  it  every  hour, 
'Twixt  Fortune  and  her  sister  Mis 

There's  most  unequal  power ; 
How  quickly  in  our  noon  of  pride 

May  clouds  obscure  the  sun  ! 
How  rapidly  we  fling  aside, 

The  wealth  so  hardly  won ! 

'Tis  so  where'er  we  turn  our  foot, 

And  sad  it  is  to  write  it ; 
A  whole  long  summer  plumps  the  fruit, — 

An  hour  of  frost  can  blight  it ! 

What  are  good  fortune's  thousand  smiles 
6* 


114 

Against  her  sister's  frown  ? 
The  ship  has  sailed  a  thousand  miles — 
One  shock  I  she  settles  down. 

'Tis  so  in  love — 'tis  so  in  fame — 

In  all  we  prize  on  earth ; 
The  priceless  jewel  of  a  name 

Untarnished  from  our  birth, 
One  moment's  folly,  passion,  haste — 

The  name  is  ruined, — gone  ! 
So  easy  'tis, — so  quick  weVaste 

The  wealth  so  hardly  won  ! 

Even  love — -the  sweetest  flower  that  stirred 

In  all  life's  gloomy  vale ! 
An  angry  breath,  a  hasty  word, 

It  sickens  in  the  gale. 
O  Life !  to  Death  thy  hourglass  toss, 

Let  all  its  sands  outrun  ! 
We  cannot  daily  bear  the  loss 

Of  joys  so  dearly  won. 


115 


THE   OPIUM  DREAM. 

The  shadows  gather  deeper  round ; 
They  come  with  a  tumultuous  sound 
Of  muttering  thunder, — and  they  swim 
Above  me,  o'er  me,  faint  and  dim — 
A  thousand  forms  of  speechless  dread 
Flap  on  with  slow  wings  o'er  my  head, 
And  slowly  stooping, — while  their  eyes 
Dilate  to  an  unnatural  size, — 
Let  fall  a  torchlight,  funeral  gleam, 
Upon  their  own  self-conjured  dream. 

They  come !     They  sail  from  darkness  out, 
A  hideous  and  fantastic  rout — 
Red  eyes  in  every  formless  head, 
Red  clots  upon  the  ghastly  dead, 
Red  robes  on  every  sweltering  corse, 
Red  squadrons,  rider,  rein  and  horse, — 
They  leap  from  the  walls  and  fill  the  air, 
Their  flying  garments  fan  my  hair — 
God  !  what  an  icy  touch  was  there ! 

Old  wrinkled  women,  in  russet  clad, 
Advancing  silently  and  sad — 


116 


Old  wrinkled  women,  whose  gleaming  eyes 
Hint  of  immortal  agonies, 
Peeping  from  under  each  bodiless  hood 
Like  phosphor  sparks  in  a  rotting  wood  ! 
Stealthy  and  silent  the  beldames  all 
Creep  up  the  perpendicular  wall; 
And  turning,  drop,  in  my  lidless  eyes, 
Their  own  unspeakable  agonies. 


O  tide  of  doubt  and  utter  woe ! 
Horrible  tide,  that  lies  below 
The  unsounded  sea  of  waking  thought ! 
Dim  tide  with  every  monster  fraught  ; 
While  others,  nor  more  pure  nor  strong, 
Hear  in  their  sleep  the  seraph's  song, 
And  mount,  as  ne'er  awake  they  rose, 
Superior  to  terrestrial  woes, — 
What  weird,  magnetic  spell  is  thine 
That  drags  me  to  your  hateful  brine, 
Whene'er  my  wearied  Reason  lowers 
Her  strained  hands  from  the  burning  oars  ? 


117 


WIDOWOLOGY    PHILOSOPHIZED. 


Oh,  none  of  your  boarding-school  misses, 

Your  "  sweet,  timid  creatures  "  for  me — 
"Who  rave  about  Cupid  and  blisses, 

Yet  know  not  what  either  may  be : 
I  don't  feel  at  all  sentimental, 

Nor  care  I  for  Byron  a  rap, — 
But  give  me  a  jolly  and  gentle 

Young  widow  in  weeds  and  a  cap ! 

n. 

To  her  I  would  offer  my  duty, 

For,  in  truth,  all  belief  it  exceeds, 
To  find  how  the  blossom  of  beauty 

Is  heightened  by  peeping  from  ''weeds; "- 
She  is  armed  cap-a-pie  for  the  struggle, — 

To  her  cap  I  a  captive  belong, 
And  the  wink  of  her  magical  ogle 

Is  a  challenge  to  courtship  and  song. 

in. 

The  tremors  of  girlhood  are  over, 
Love's  blossom  has  ripened  to  fruit ; 


118 

And  her  "  first  love, "  asleep  under  clover, 
Is  the  soil  where  my  passion  takes  root : 

'Tis  pleasant  to  know,  "  the  departed 
Was  tenderly  cared  to  the  last " — 

And  that  she  will  not  die  broken-hearted, 
If  I  should  pop  off  just  as  fast. 

IV. 

Her  temper  is  never  so  restive, 

Her  duty  she  knows — and  a  shape 
Is  never  so  sweetly  suggestive 

As  when  it  is  muffled  in  crape. 
The  maid  wears  one  ring  when  she  marries, 

In  proof  she  all  others  discards — 
But  the  widow-wife  wiselier  carries 

A  pair  of  these  marital  guards  ! 

v. 

So  none  of  your  boarding-school  misses, 

Your  sweet,  timid  creatures  for  me, 
Who  rave  about  Cupid  and  blisses, 

Yet  know  not  what  either  may  be  ! 
I  don't  feel  at  all  sentimental, 

Nor  care  I  for  Byron  a  rap — 
Give  me  a  plump,  jolly  and  gentle 

Young  widow  in  weeds  and  a  cap ! 


119 


THE  WELL-DRESSED  MAN. 

My  poor  old  coat  !  my  holy  coat  ! 

But  not  like  that  of  Treves — 
With  pain  ineffable  I  note 

Your  soiled  and  tattered  sleeves  ; 
Time  was,  my  coat,  that  I  in  you 

Right  daintily  began 
To  take  of  life  a  jovial  view — 

I  was  a  well-dressed  man. 

My  laundress  called, — her  pay  required,- 

I  paid — my  morning  call ; 
Attired  in  thee  'till  fairly  tired 

I  danced  at  rout  and  ball : — 
The  ladies  smiled,  and  as  I  passed 

The  pleasing  whisper  ran 
"  There's  Mr.  H.,— he's  rather  fast, 

But  such  a  well-dressed  man  !" 

My  tailor's  bill  was  much  behind, 

And  I  for  board  was  bored ; 
But  still  the  landlady  was  kind, 

And  still  mein  Schneider  scored ; — 


120 

"  He  feared  to  press,  but  could  I  pay  ?" 
'Twas  thus  the  rogue  began — 

She  "  really  could  not  turn  away 
So  sweetly  dressed  a  man." 

I  drove  abroad,  I  drank  my  wine, — 

Match-making  mothers  sought  me, — 
And  many  a  maiden  fair  and  fine 

Flushed  red  to  think  she'd  caught  me ; 
With  tongue  and  pen  I  played  my  part, 

To  dazzle  was  my  plan, — 
None  e'er  could  deem  an  aching  heart 

In  such  a  well-dressed  man. 

But  ah  !  it  is  the  utmost  pound 

That  kills  the  patient  camel, — 
And  to  my  horror  soon  I  found 

My  debts  I  could  not  trammel ; 
My  tailor's  "  tick"  grew  short, — and  quick 

A  hundred  duns  began — 
One  suit  of  clothes  had  saved  their  suits 

Against  the  well-dressed  man. 

I'm  beggared  now, — but  you'll  allow 
It  was  a  sad  temptation. 


121 

Obscure  to  live,  while  clothes  can  give 

Respect  and  social  station. 
It  could  not  last,  my  folly's  past, 

I've  learned  a  wiser  plan, — 
By  hand  and  brain  I'll  be  again 

A  (paid  for)  well-dressed  man  ! 


WOMAN'S  RIGHTS. 


0  ladies,  will  you  hear  a  truth, 

Of  late  too  seldom  told  to  you  ? 
Nor  deem — he  begs  it  of  your  ruth — 

The  writer  over-bold  to  you. 
For,  by  the  pulses  of  his  youth, 

He  never  yet  was  cold  to  you. 
And,  therefore,  'tis  in  sober  sooth, 

That  he  would  now  unfold  to  you 
What  may, — apart  from  rhythmic  nights, — 
Be  called,  the  sum  of  "  Woman's  Rights." 


122 


n. 


For  you  the  calm  sequestered  bowers, 

For  us  to  kneel  and  sue  to  you ; 
Your  feet  upon  the  path  of  flowers 

We  struggle  still  to  strew  to  you ; 
For  you  to  drop  the  healing  showers 

Of  kindness,  (gentle  dew  to  you,) 
On  failing  health  and  wasted  powers — 

The  task  is  nothing  new  to  you. 
"  Oh,  these,  indeed  !" — 'tis  Love  indites, — 
"  These  are  unquestioned  Woman's  Rights." 


in. 


All  hail !  we  cry,  the  stormiest  hours, 

If  thus  a  joy  we  woo  to  you ! 
For  us,  of  life's  drugged  bowl,  the  sours, 

If  so  the  sweets  ensue  to  you ! 
When  many  a  heavy  hap  was  ours, 

Fond  retrospection  flew  to  you — 
Good  husbands  and  unstinted  dowers, 

And  smiling  babes  accrue  to  you  ! 
And,  let  me  ask,  what  maiden  slights 
These  latter-mentioned  "Woman's  Rights?" 


123 


IV. 


The  faithfulness,  the  grace,  the  high 

Pure  thoughts  of  life  we  gain  by  you ; 
The  vision  of  a  softer  eye, 

The  finer  touch  attain  by  you. 
"Weak  hopes  that  unto  death  are  nigh 

Outleaning,  we  sustain  by  you ; 
And  when  misfortune  sweeps  the  sky, 

Our  anchored  hearts  remain  by  you. 
Long  days  of  toil  and  feverish  nights, 
Would  ill  repay  these  "  Woman's  Rights." 


IV. 


When  mildewed  spinsters,  in  the  sere 

And  fruitless  leaf,  proclaim  to  you 
That  "  If  you  knew  your  '  wrongs'  as  clear 

As  they  your  '  rights'  could  name  to  you — 
The  tiger,  wounded  by  a  spear, 

Would  be  a  creature  tame  to  you, 
While  tyrant  man,  in  guilty  fear, 

Would  bow  his  head  in  shame  to  you," 
Reply,  "  Sour  grapes  !"  and  quench  the  "  Lights" 
Of  this  new  creed  in  u  Woman's  Rights." 


124 


VI. 

Why  quit  the  calm  and  holy  hearth, 

That  is  Heaven's  antepast  to  us, 
To  face  the  sterner  scenes  of  earth — 

The  troubles  that  are  cast  to  us  ? 
Why  change  your  soul's  unsullied  mirth 

For  woes  that  rush  so  fast  to  us 
That  we  would  daily  curse  our  birth, 

Were  not  your  sphere  at  last  to  us, — 
That  sphere  of  home,  which  well  requites 
The  loss  of  these  Un-sexing  Rights. 


THE  ISLANDS   THAT   AWAIT  US. 

Come,  brothers,  fill !     To-night  we  will 

Give  joy  its  longest  tether, 
Take  hands  around — let  music  sound — 

We're  exiles  here  together. 
For  Fatherland  we  draw  the  brand, 

We  failed,  but  do  not  falter; 


125 

Some  other  day  again  we  may 
Fling  fire  on  Freedom's  altar. 

The  toast  to-night  is  one  of  light, 
Let's  drink  ere  time  belate  us, 

Come,  brim  the  glass  and  let  it  pass — 
"  The  islands  that  await  us !" 

There's  Cuba  lies  in  sunniest  skies, 

By  Spanish  thraldom  trampled ; 
Her  treasure  spent,  and  blood  besprent, 

Her  wrongs  are  unexampled. 
But  exiled  sons  with  Yankee  guns 

Can  make  the  tyrants  vanish ; 
For  once  we'll  teach  these  grandees  each 

The  way  to  "  walk  it  Spanish." 
The  one  Lone  Star  shall  not  be  far 

From  our  unspotted  cluster  ! 
The  Southern  Queen  shall  yet  be  seen 

Arrayed  in  northern  lustre ! 

There's  Ireland,  too — 'tis  vain  to  rue 
The  doom  imprinted  on  her ; 

Some  day  we'll  make,  or  we  mistake, 
That  very  curse  her  honor. 


126 

The  green  shall  spread  above  the  red, 

When  Saxon  blood  is  under ; 
And  old  John  Bull  at  Liverpool 

Be  waked  by  Yankee  thunder  ! 
The  "  Eastern  Queen"  in  starry  sheen 

With  her  of  the  Antilles, 
The  Yankees'  banner  floating  high 

O'er  shamrocks  and  o'er  lilies. 


Then,  brethren,  fill — pledge  heart  and  will  ! 

* 

Our  "  cause"  we'll  try  and  gain,  too ; 
The  exile's  name  shall  reach  a  fame 

No  king's  could  e'er  attain  to  ! 
In  France  at  first  was  freedom  nursed 

But  there,  so  wild  and  skittish, 
She  fell  a  prey  one  luckless  day 

To  Spaniards  and  the  British ! 
But  here  with  growth  surpassing  both, 

Majestic  is  her  status, 
And  to  her  sod,  so  help  us  God ! 

We'll  bring  the  "  Isles  that  wait  us  !" 


127 
A   CALIFORNIAN   DITTY. 

When  lovely  Blousalinda  Jones, 
(She  always  was  a  gadder,) 

Did  marry,  then  I  took  my  bones 
To  the  Seeraw  Neevadder. 

My  pick  it  seemed  to  have  a  charm, 

So  quickly  did  I  pocket 
Enough  to  buy  a  jolly  farm, 

To  build  a  house  and  stock  it ! 

The  gold  became  my  child  apace, 
And  I  did  rock  its  cradle, 

And  for  to  clean  its  yaller  face 
I  used  both  pan  and  ladle. 

And  day  by  day  the  bright  sun  rolled 
Above  a  brighter  treasure ; 

And  day  by  day  in  gathering  gold, 
I  took  a  wilder  pleasure. 

The  miners  called  me  "  Stingy  Sam," 
Because  I  played  no  euchre ; 

But  yet  I  was  not  then  nor  am 
The  slave  of  filthy  lucre. 


128 

There's  no  man  that  can  see  the  heart — 
The  bosom  has  no  winder — 

Else  had  they  seen,  from  gold  apart, 
The  love  of  Blousalinder. 

I  vowed  revenge  against  that  prig, 
(Her  husband  he,)  Joe  Slammers. 

(He  is  a  cove  as  wears  a  wig, 

Is  lame,  and  squints,  and  stammers.) 

I  swore  that  Mrs.  S.  some  day 
Should  envy  me  prodigious ; — 

I'd  live  beside  her,  and  display 
What  might  have  been  her  riches ! 

I'd  lend  her  husband  money,  and 
I  then  would  prosecute  him  : 

Were  he  in  that  auriferous  land 
'Twould  be  no  sin  to  shoot  him. 

For  this  it  was  I  drove  my  stakes 

Away  on  Feather  river, 
(Lord  !  but  I  had  the  ager  shakes, 

And  suffered  from  my  liver !) 


129 

And  so,  with  forty  thousand  clear,^ 

I  shipped  among  the  sailors : 
One  April  day  I  landed  here, 

And  went  into  a  tailor's. 

I  told  him  that  I  wanted  all 

My  clothes  of  brightest  colors — 

The  largest  patterns  (nothing  "  small,") 
They  cost  me  eighty  dollars. 

With  watches  and  with  golden  chains, 

•And  rings  upon  my  fingers, 
I  roamed,  as  do  upon  the  plains 

Them  gaudy  birds — flamingers. 

I  started  off,  as  luck  did  hap, 

To  see  my  Blousalinder — 
I  saw  her  in  a  widow's  cap, 

A-sitting  at  the  winder ! 

She  told  me  that  her  husband,  Joe, 
The  very  morn  of  marriage, 

Had  tripped  and  broke  his  precious  neck 
A-getting  in  the  carriage ; 
7 


130 

And  how,  although  she  bid  me  go 

When  the  night  was  dark  and  clammy, 

She  always  loved  me  more  than  Joe, 
And  then  she  called  me  "  Sammy  1" 


IGDRASIL. 

The  tree  of  life,  that  shone  so  fair 

In  Spring's  alternate  shine  and  shower, 
What  bitter  fruit  its  branches  bear ! 

How  soon  'tis  stripped  of  leaf  and  flower  ! 
As  if  athwart  the  sheltering  glade 

Had  swept  the  pestilent  simoom ; 
Nor  ever  more  beneath  its  shade 

Shall  violet  ope,  or  primrose  bloom  ! 

No  more  beneath  its  spreading  leaves, 
Shall  weary  lambs  at  noontide  throng, 

While  overhead  the  linnet  weaves 
The  silken  tenor  of  his  song  ! 


131 


No  more  the  pale  and  sorrowing  moon 

Her  dewy  tears  above  it  weep  ! 
No  more  at  night's  unbroken  noon 

Shall  Muse  beneath  its  branches  sleep  ! 

For  blight  hath  fallen  on  bud  and  leaf, 

And  turned  its  fruitful  sap  to  gall ; 
And  mildewed  in  the  showers  of  grief, 

It  totters  to  an  early  fall ! 
The  bough  the  redbreast  used  to  love, 

Now  nightly  hears  the  owlet  hoot — 
The  locust  gnaws  the  leaves  above, 

The  cankerworm  is  at  the  root ! 

Then  shall  it  fall,  and  leave  behind 

No  record  of  the  brighter  past, — 
Uprooted  by  the  idle  wind, 

And  whirled  away  upon  the  blast ! 
Forfend  it,  Heaven  !  a  soil  too  warm 

Hath  nursed  this  plague — transplant  it  now 
Where  drifting  rain  and  eddying  storm, 

May  purge  the  root,  and  cleanse  the  bough. 

And  Hope — who  long  had  listened  mute — 

Now  raised  her  azure  eyes,  and  smiled : 
She  whispered  low  of  future  fruit, 


132 

And  pointed  to  the  distant  wild. 
Oh,  bear  it  thither !  trust  in  God ! 

Have  faith  in  my  prophetic  words, 
Again  'twill  spread  its  arms  abroad 

And  shelter  its  deserted  birds ! 


BACHELOR'S   ADIEU. 


Adieu  to  the  glory  of  bachelor  parties, 

The  looseness  of  riot,  the  cards  and  the  cup  ! 
Old  Hymen  has  caught  me — so,  farewell !  my  hearties, 

The  game  (as  we  say  in  the  vulgate)  is  up ! 
No  more  shall  my  voice,  when  'tis  mellowed  by  sherry, 

Troll  out  the  wild  glee  of  the  "  Grape  and  the  Boar;" 
Henceforward,  without  me,  be  social  and  merry — 

My  voice  shall  be  heard  in  your  circle  no  more. 


133 


n. 

Yet  sometimes,  when  Joy  her  white  curtain  is  flinging 

Between  your  rapt  eyes  and  the  blackness  of  Care, — 
When  gaming,  and  dancing,  and  drinking  and  singing 

Usurp  the  bronze  throne  of  the  giant  Despair, — 
Let  memory  paint  me  as  once,  in  your  middle, 

I  brimmed  a  full  glass  to  the  toast  of  "  The  Fair !" 
When  with  trumpet  and  gong,  the  cornopian  and  fiddle, 

We  made  the  dull  folk  of  our  neighborhood  stare ! 

in. 

O,  think  of  me  then ;  and  imagine  me  sitting, 

"  My  lip,'1  as  she  says,  "by  cigars  undefiled," 
Calmly  holding  a  skein  for  my  wife,  who  is  knitting, 

Or  rocking  a  cradle,  or  dandling  a  child. 
Imagine  me  thus  !  and  affection  will  offer 

A  tear  for  the  fate  of  a  brother  in  woe ; 
Though  of  Hymen  I  once  was  an  infidel  scoffer, 

He  has  treated  me  thus,  and  will  treat  you  all  so. 

IV. 

Avoid  him  !     For  he  like  a  lion  is  waiting, 
To  fall  on  the  careless  who  saunter  along ! 

He  sends  a  young  Cupid,  who,  laughing  and  prating, 
Decoys  us  away  with  a  smile  and  a  song ; 


134 


He  leads  up  a  path  that  is  bordered  with  roses, 

Where  sculpture,  and  grottos,  and  fountains  are  rife ; 

At  the  end  of  the  vista  a  Venus  reposes ; 

We  kiss  her, — and  Hymen  has  noosed  us  for  life  ! 


v. 

Henceforward,  the  fair  one  whose  mystical  beauty 
Entranced  every  fibre,  and  thrilled  every  bone, 

Is  ours  by  the  law ;  and  our  business  and  duty 
Becomes  to  love  her,  and  to  love  her  alone ! 

But  ah  !  to  the  heart  so  abhorrent  is  bondage, 

It  hates,  because  right,  what  'twould  love  were  it 
wrong,— 

And  the  path — all  so  green  in  our  youth  and  our  fond 

age- 
Grows  thorny,  and  tedious,  and  dreary,  and  long ! 


VI. 

I'm  married,  alas  !  and  (of  course  !)  I  am  happy  ; 

The  married  (0  Lord !)  they  must  "  all  happy  be" — 
But  I  think  of  the  nights  when  we  "bowsed  at  the 
nappy," 

And  drop  a  few  tears  in  my  third  cup  of  tea. 


135 


No  more  shall  the  polka's  bewild'ring  gyrations 
Inflame  the  warm  eyes  till  they  sparkle  with  love ; 

I  must  sit  down  sedately,  and  shun  such  temptations, 
With  my  thoughts,  or  my  eyes  at  least,  fastened 
above ! 

VIL 

And  don't,  if  you  call — Oh,  for  my  sake,  remember — 

Don't  whisper  a  word  of  the  nights  we  have  had ! 
Declare  I  was  always  as  cold  as  December, — 

A  youth  much  religious,  and  gentle  and  sad, 
A  man  who  detested  all  noise  and  confusion, 

Who  cried  that  a  polka  was  flagrant  and  vain, 
And  would  never  permit  even  the  slightest  infusion 

Of  brandy  or  wine  the  pure  element  stain  ! 


VIII. 

Above  all — not  a  word  of  the  girl  of  the  ballet 

You  found  in  my  rooms  when  you  called  rather  late 
Never  venture  a  hint  of  Maria  or  Sally — 

Be  silent,  in  mercy — and  "  mum"  about  Kate! 
But  tell  her  I  loved  still  to  linger  and  daudle 

The  whole  evening  long  o'er  religion  and  tea  ; 
Describe  me  a  pattern  young  man,  and  a  model 

Of  all  that  a  husband  should  properly  be  ! 


136 


THE  CRYSTAL  PALACE. 

Ho!  ye  who  urge  the  fiery  car, 

And  ye  who  shoot  the  flashing  spindle, 
If  labor  be  prolonged  too  far, 

Both  mind  and  body  dwindle  I 
And  ye,  who  from  the  stubborn  soil 

Extort  the  full  of  Plenty's  chalice, 
Come,  see  the  garland  woven  for  Toil, — 

Attend  the  Crystal  Palace  I 

Here  men  of  every  clime  and  line 

As  brethren  meet — as  freemen  mingle — 
And  help  to  deck  the  industrial  shrine 

With  heart  and  purpose  single. 
To  lead  no  martial  tilt  to-day 

Are  all  these  hundred  flags  unfurled  ; 
Nor  meet  for  internecine  fray 

The  craftsmen  of  the  world. 

The  central  dome — behold  it  soar, 
A  kind  of  glass  and  iron  bubble, 

All  painted  and  emblazoned  o'er 
With  much  artistic  trouble. 


137 

And  borne  on  reed-like  pillars — dim 

With  softened  light  and  rich  with  gilding 

The  trellised  galleries  seem  to  swim 
Around  the  liquid  building. 

Here  through  the  long-resounding  aisles, 

The  organ's  solemn  tone  is  pealing ; 
And  here  Italia's  sculpture  smiles 

In  all  its  wealth  of  feeling. 
Here  bright  brocades  and  silks  unrolled, 

Around  each  frescoed  column  cluster  ; 
And  silver  groups  and  cups  of  gold 

Flash  back  the  noontide  lustre. 

Here  steel-clad  knights  look  wondering  down 

On  this  five-century-later-revel ; 
They  hope  to  see  at  least  one  Crown 

Disturb  the  vulgar  level. 
But  in  the  centre — raise  your  glance  ! 

That  mighty  form — we  bow  before  it — 
Plucked  down  the  "  cap  of  maintenance" 

And  placed  the  people's  o'er  it ! 
7* 


138 


0  God !  'tis  sweet  to  think  there  is— 
While  Europe  seems  to  nerve  her  sinews 

For  the  last  desperate  strife — in  this 
A  land  where  Peace  continues. 

Transplanted  here,  on  plain  and  crag 

May  bloom  each  flower  that  Wrong  had  blighted, 

While,  awed  before  our  roving  flag, 
The  despot  shrinks  affrighted ! 

But  why  discourse  of  sober  themes  ? 

No  intellectual  Maine  laws  bind  us, 
And  we  may  tipple  heavenly  dreams 

And  leave  "  dull  care  behind  us." 
Amid  these  throngs  are  young  and  old — 

The  gay,  the  great — a  flood  of  faces  ; 
A  clash  of  tongues — the  fair,  the  bold — 

Each  with  distinctive  traces. 


The  eye  is  fed  on  forms  of  power, 
Retained  in  memory  ever  after  ; 

The  ear  drinks  music  hour  by  hour, 
The  hum  of  speech  and  laughter. 


139 

And,  like  a  hot-house  plant,  the  mind 
Expanding  near  this  crystal  fountain 

Attains  a  growth  it  ne'er  may  find 
Upon  the  hermit-mountain. 

Man  is  gregarious ;  each  can  strike 

But  one  chord  by  his  own  exertion , 
Dipt  in  Life's  sea,  Achilles-like, 

We  profit  by  immersion  : 
And  from  a  myriad  bosoms,  rife 

With  love,  one  general  chorus  fleeing, 
Bears  up  to  God  "  The  Psalm  of  Life," 

The  melody  of  Being. 

Then  workers  from  whatever  land, 

Of  every  race  and  rank,  come  hither  ! 
And  eye  to  eye,  and  hand  to  hand, 

Compare  your  works  together  ! 
Here  Art  and  Toil  and  Science  sit, 

Presiding  o'er  their  mingled  treasure  ; 
The  feast  is  spread,  sit  down  to  it 

For  profit  and  for  pleasure. 


140 


THE  MORNING  SERENADE. 


[Translated  from  B6ranger.] 


Hose  !  the  red  sun  peeps  o'er  the  hill ; 

O,  quit  your  couch's  soft  retreat ! 
Dost  thou  not  hear  the  village  bell 

Chime  forth  the  hour  when  we  should  meet  ? 
The  crowded  town  no  pleasure  yields, 

Then  hie  with  me — 0,  hie  away  ! 
And,  wandering  through  the  flowery  fields, 

Let's  pass  in  love  the  summer's  day. 

Come,  Rose  !  the  fields  with  flowers  are  crowned; 

My  arm  thy  gentle  prop  shall  be — 
With  loving  nature  all  around, 

We  too  will  love  more  tenderly  ! 
The  woodbine  bower  the  linnet  shields, 

And  there  it  sings  the  livelong  day ; 
Then,  haste !  0,  haste  then  to  the  fields, 

Where  hours,  like  moments,  glide  away ! 


141 


In  rustic  form  our  life  to  mould, 

We'll  rise  when  dawn's  first  glances  peep ; 
And  evening's  shadows  on  the  wold 

Shall  herald  our  untroubled  sleep; 
Perchance  to  thee  this  prospect  yields 

But  tedious  days,  and  weary  hours  ; 
Or  dost  thou  love  the  scented  fields, 

The  song-birds,  and  the  breezy  bowers  ? 

She  comes ! — the  town  no  more  appears — 

0  hateful  city,  fare  thee  well ! 
Where  art  its  lifeless  beauty  rears, 

But  genuine  passion  dare  not  dwell. 
Rose,  let  us  quit  Parisian  noise, 

For  sweet  seclusion,  far  away  : 
Our  moments  crowned  with  rustic  joys, 

Our  love  increasing  day  by  day. 


142 


ROMANCE   AND  ECHO. 


It  rains,  it  rains — the  slimy  street 
Is  silent,  though  a  hundred  feet 
In  eager  hurry  homeward  beat — 

(Coz  why  ?  they  all  wear  rubbers.) 
They  hurry  homeward,  there  to  meet 
The  tender  ones  who  long  to  greet 
Papa  and  husband — oh  !  'tis  sweet — 

(Wife  scolds  and  baby  blubbers.) 


n. 


The  skies  have  all  their  clouds  amassed, 
But  sunshine  waits  them,  and  will  last 
When  they  into  their  homes  have  passed 

(I  wouldn't  like  to  risk  it.) 
No  rain-tears  there,  no  cutting  blast 
Of  angry  words ;   the  hours  as  fast 
As  moments  fly.     They  find  at  last — 

(Weak  tea  and  leathern  biscuit.} 


143 


in. 


What  tongue  describe,  what  pen  portray, 
The  transports  which,  at  close  of  day, 
The  working  head  and  hand  repay  ? 

(Due  bills,  sour  looks  and  twaddle.) 
O  Seraphina !  soon  I  pray, 
With  thee  to  bless  my  onward  way, 
Our  home,  though  humble,  shall  be  gay — 

(There  was  a  man  called  "  Caudle.") 


IV. 


I  do  not  smoke — was  never  "  tight  " — 
And  while  your  beauties  charm  my  sight 
I'll  find  the  marriage  burden  light — 

(As  soldiers  find  their  knapsacks.) 
And  home  returning  night  by  night, 
Your  eyes,  the  hearth,  and  all  things  bright, 
O,  will  you  not  my  toils  requite, 

(With  pickled  pork  and  flapjacks  ?) 


144 
"FLEUVE  DU  TAGE." 

[Translated  from  the  French.] 

Thou  bounding  river, 

I  fly  thy  tranquil  shore. 
Farewell !  0,  never 

Shall  I  behold  thee  more. 
Ye  rocks,  ye  woods,  that  quiver 

To  echo's  plaintive  cry, 
Farewell,  for  ever  ! 

We  part  and  part  for  aye. 

Thou  shady  grotto  ! 

In  raptures  deep  and  true, 
When  near  to  Mary 

How  quick  the  moments  flew  ! 
Thy  dark  retreat,  all  lonely, 

Where  mystery  ever  dwells, 
Was  to  me,  only 

Full  of  delicious  spells  ! 

Days  when  we  are  glad, 
Ye  fleet  away  like  dreams ! 

Days  when  we  are  sad, 
0,  howlong  each  seems  ! 


145 

Far  from  my  own  loved  Mary 
For  ever  severed  wide. 

Dark,  dark,  and  dreary 
Time  rolls  its  sullen  tide  ! 

0  valley  fairest ! 

Sweet  valley  of  my  youth  ! 
0  Mary,  dearest, 

Thee  have  I  loved  in  truth  ! 
Ye  rocks,  ye  woods  that  quiver 

To  echo's  plaintive  cry, 
Farewell,  for  ever ! 

We  part  and  part  for  aye  ! 


WHY   LOVE   THE  TURK  AND   HATE 
THE  CZAR? 


Why  should  we  love  the  heathen  Turk 
And  hate  the  Christian  Czar — 

While  Russia  is,  in  wealth  and  work, 
"  More  civilized"  by  far  ? 


146 

Her  banner  bears  the  Holy  Cross 
Wherewith  our  creed  is  signed, 

While  Turkey's  Pachas  only  toss 
Their  horsetails  to  the  wind. 

ii. 

Why  hate  the  Czar,  and  pray  for  him 

Whose  grim  seraglio  walls 
Hold  beauties  that  are  growing  dim, — 

His  concubines  and  thralls  ? 
Why  hate  the  Czar  and  wish  success 

To  one  who  dares  to  libel 
Oar  telegraph  and  printing  press, 

Our  cotton  goods  and  Bible  ? 

in. 

The  Czar  is  "  civilized," — of  course, — 

He  writes  it  on  his  banner  ; 
A  Christian  praying  till  he's  hoarse 

In  the  devoutest  manner ; 
One  wife  alone  he  has  to  kiss, 

As  in  Church  members  seemly, — • 
And  in  his  walk  of  life  he  is 

"  Respectable  extremely." 


147 


IV. 

The  Sultan  hath  a  stud  of  wives, 

And  Sultans  have — they  tell  us — 
An  awkward  trick  of  taking  lives 

From  all  obnoxious  fellows. 
Their  headlong  passions  will  not  brook 

To  mingle  farce  with  fury, 
And  wring  from  death  the  killing  joke 

Of  "  Murder  done  by  Jury." 

v. 

The  "  March  of  Intellect"  is  quite 

A  march  beyond  their  drilling  ; 
They  never  made  a  "  proselyte" 

By  one  judicious  shilling — 
Deficient  much  in  legal  skill 

And  "  organized  starvation," 
They  never  mixed  a  patent  pill 

For  Turkish  "  melioration." 

VI. 

In  fact,  we  say — with  deep  regret, 
But  truth  must  be  our  sure  hope — 

The  Sultan  is  some  ages  yet 
Behind  the  kings  of  Europe. 


148 

He  has  not  got  the  royal  blood 

Which  festers  so  "  divinely" 
In  men  not  made  of  common  mud, 

But  "  porcelain  painted  finely." 

VII. 

He  has  not  got  the  Russian  knout 

Wherewith  the  nuns  were  beaten  ; 
Nor  Austria's  axe — grown  fat,  no  doubt, 

On  all  the  fleshjft.  has  eaten. 
No  guilt-extracting  guillotine, 

As  France  has  got  to  cure  hers — 
But  worst  of  all  and  deadliest  sin, 

He  has  no  "  British  Jurors." 

VIII. 

He  thinks  kings  should,  against  all  taste, 

Have  nothing  underhand  meant ; 
Whereas  all  know  the  crown  is  placed 

Above  the  tenth  commandment. 
For  we  believe  that  monarchs  are 

Exempt  from  keeping  promise ; 
Especially  the  Queen  and  Czar — 

Grod  keep  their  armies  from  us  ! 


149 

IX. 

Then  why,  we  ask — what  mysteries  lurk 

That  we  are  so  excited, 
While  burglar  Nick  and  goodman  Turk 

Are  getting  matters  righted  ? 
A  friend  suggests  some  twaddling  cant 

Of  justice  and  humanity  ! 
Such  trifles  ought  not,  and  they  shan't 

Impede  our  Christianity. 

x. 

We  want  to  save  the  Turkish  souls 

By  cleaving  skulls  asunder, — 
Destroy  them  as  we  did  the  Poles, 

And  profit  by  the  plunder. 
We  mean  to  give  them  gospel  light, 

By  piercing  lights  and  livers — • 
When  dead  and  at  the  judgment-seat, 

They'll  then  be  "  true  believers  !" 

XI. 

But  if — with  merely  human  hearts — 
We  ask,  "  How  goes  the  war  ?" 

One  hoarse-tongued  execration  starts 
Against  the  butcher  Czar. 


150 

There  reeks  a  cloud  from  Poland's  sod, 

That  takes  a  giant  form — 
A  mangled,  but  immortal  god  ! 

Much  wasted,  but  yet  warm. 

XII. 

And  from  the  plains  of  Hungary 

Another  cloud  ascends : 
Heaven  !  what  a  fury-frenzied  eye 

Upon  the  North  it  bends. 
A  woman  form — a  Juno  shape — 

Queen  mother  of  the  gods  ! 
A  woman,  but  her  shoulders  drip 

Ploughed  red  with  Russian  rods  ! 

XIII. 

Lo  !  watch  them — watch  them  evermore 

Until  the  rite  be  done  ; 
High  up  in  air  their  lips  converge — 

That  kiss  hath  made  them  one  ! 
From  that  embrace  they  quickly  turn, 

Their  cloud-hands  moving  north, 
And  in  their  eyes  the  lightnings  burn 

Which  soon  shall  thunder  forth. 


151 


xiv. 

God  speed  the  union,  sealed  in  blood, 

Of  Freedom  and  Despair  ! 
God  speed  the  cause  of  human  right 

Whenever  and  where'er  ! 
God  speed  the  Turk  !     God  speed  the  Pole  ! 

God  speed  whoe'er  will  fight 
With  sword  and  word,  heart,  brain  and  hand, 

For  man's  eternal  right ! 


DUET  FOR  THE  BREAKFAST  TABLE, 


Romantic  Husband — 

i 
Thou  art  my  love ! — I  have  none  other 

But  only  thee, — but  only  thee — 

Sensible  Wife— 

Now  Charles,  do  stop  this  silly  bother, 
And  drink  your  tea, — your  cooling  tea ! 


152 


Romantic  Husband — 

Your  eyes  are  diamonds, — gems  refined, — 
Your  teeth  are  pearl, — your  hair  is  gold,- 

Sensible  Wife-— 

O  nonsense  now  ! — I  know  you'll  find 
Your  cutlets  cold, — exceeding  cold. 

Romantic  Husband — 

Where'er  thou  art,  my  passions  burn ; 
I  envy  not  the  monarch's  crown ! 

Sensible  Wife — 

Put  some  hot  water  in  the  urn, 

And  toast  this  bread,  and  toast  it  brown ! 

Romantic  Husband — 

Had  I  Grolconda's  wealth,  I  say, 

'Twere  thine  at  will,  'twere  thine  at  will ; 

Sensible  Wife — 

Then  let  me  have  a  check  to  pay 

The  dry-goods  bill, — that  tedious  bill ! 


153 


Romantic  Husband — 

O  heed  it  not,  my  trembling  flower ! — 
If  want  should  press  us,  let  it  come  ! 

Sensible  Wife— 

And,  apropos,  the  bill  for  flour 
Is  quite  a  sum, — an  unpaid  sum. 

Romantic  Husband — 

So  rich  in  love — so  rich  in  joy — 
No  change  our  cup  of  bliss  can  spill. 

Sensible  Wife — 

Now  do  be  quiet : — you  destroy 

My  cambric  frill, — my  well-starched  frill. 

Romantic  Husband — 

Ha  !  senseless,  soulless,  loveless  girl, 
To  sympathy  and  passion  dead ! 

Sensible  Wife — 

A  moment  since  I  was  your  "  pearl," 

Your  "  only  love1' — at  least,  you  said. 
8 


154 


Romantic  Husband — 

I  spoke  it  in  the  bitter  jest 

Of  one  his  own  deep  sadness  scorning. 

Sensible  Wife — 

Well,  candor  is  at  all  times  best  ; 
I  wish  you,  sir,  a  fair  good  morning  ! 


THE  PRISONER  OF  WAR. 

[Translated  from  Beranger.] 
LES    HIRONDELLES. 

A  captive  on  Africa's  shore, 
A  warrior  laden  with  chains, 

Exclaimed — I  behold  ye  once  more, 
As  ye  fly  from  the  frozen  plains, 


155 

Ye  swallows,  whom  Hope,  in  despite 
Of  this  fierce-glowing  climate,  pursues  !- 

From  France  ye  have  taken  your  flight — 
Of  my  home  do  ye  bring  me  no  news  ? 


Three  summers,  I've  begged  that  ye  might 

Recall  the  fond  wishes  that  stray 
To  that  vale,  where  in  dreams  of  delight, 

My  youth  rolled  unheeded  away — 
To  the  river  whose  winding  waves  foam 

'Neath  lilac  bowers,  scenting  the  breeze  ! 
Ye  have  perched  on  my  sweet  cottage-home— 

Have  ye  nothing  to  tell  me  of  these  ? 


Perchance  your  young  nestlings  were  born 

'Neath  the  roof  where  I  welcomed  the  day  ! 
Ye  have  pitied  my  mother's  heart  torn 

By  the  love  which  can  never  decay  ! 
Though  dying  she  hopes  that  each  hour 

My-  step  on  the  silence  will  break — 
She  listens — and  fast  her  tears  shower, — 

Of  her  love  have  ye  nothing  to  speak  ? 


156 


My  sister  !  perchance  she  is  wed  ! 

Have  ye  seen  the  gay  youth  who  in  throngs 
At  the  feast  of  her  bridal  were  met, 

And  welcomed  her  marriage  with  songs  ? 
And  those — my  companions  of  yore — 

Who  lived  through  the  combats  we  fought — 
Do  they  dwell  in  the  village  once  more  ? 

Of  so  many  friends  know  ye  naught? 


It  may  be  the  stranger's  foot  presses 

The  graves  in  the  vale  where  they  sleep  ! 
My  home  a  new  master  possesses — 

He  causes  my  sister  to  weep ; 
No  prayers  that  for  me  wing  to  Heaven, 

And  torture  and  fetters  below — 
Your  silence  in  mercy  is  given 

To  spare  me  this  burden  of  wo  ? 


157 
MATRIMONIAL  COMPLACENCY. 

Since  Grace  and  I  were  double, 

I'd  have  the  world  to  know, 
We've  been  a  goodish  couple, 

As  goodish  couples  go  ! 
To  no  ecstatic  passion 

Our  present  hearts  respond ; 
But  it  is  out  of  fashion 

For  couples  to  be  fond. 

She  is  not  quite  a  "  seraph," 

A  "  being  born  above,'' — 
As  milliner  and  sheriff 

With  bills  and  writs  can  prove ; 
Her  dress  is  more  than  costly, 

Her  taste  in  music  fine — 
She  eats,  and  it  is  vastly 

As  other  people  dine. 

I  thought  her  once  angelic — 

A  fairy  she  did  seem; 
There  is  not  now  a  relic 

Of  that  diviner  dream. 


158 

She  don't  object  to  heaping 

A  pie-plate  filled  before ; 
And  once,  when  she  was  sleeping, 

I  thought  I  heard  a  snore  ! 

Nor  am  I  now  her  hero, 

The  "  worshipped  one  alone  ;" 
A  matrimonial  Nero 

She  seems  to  think  me  grown. 
"  A  brute,"  should  I  refuse  her 

That  "  dear,  sweet  Cashmere  shawl"- 
"  Worse  than  a  brute  I  use  her," 

If  kept  in  town  the  fall. 

Cigars  are  her  "  abhorrence," 

She  "  hates  the  sight  of  wine," 
And  "  no  presumption  warrants" 

A  friend  brought  home  to  dine ; 
She  won't  believe  'tis  business 

That  keeps  me  late  at  night, — 
And  on  the  slightest  dizziness, 

I  am  condemned  as  "  tight  " 

But  still,  despite  this  trouble, 

These  little  puffs  of  woe, 
We  make  a  goodish  couple, 

As  goodish  couples  go  ! 


159 

To  no  ecstatic  passion 

Our  present  hearts  respond; 
But  it  is  outfjfashion 

For  couples  to  be  fond. 


WE  MIGHT  HAVE  BEEN. 

There  is  a  whisper  ringing  clear 
In  every  sleepless  listener's  ear, 
A  whisper  of  but  scanty  cheer, 
And  heard  distinctlier  every  year — 

"  You  might  have  been — you  might  have  been." 

Breathing  throughout  the  hush  of  night, 
It  shuns  companionship  and  light ; 
A  knell,  a  blessing,  and  a  blight, 
We  profit  if  we  hear  aright 

"  You  might  have  been — you  might  have  been." 


160 


As  memory  bids  the  past  arise, 
The  soaring  hopes  that  swept  the  skies, 
(P]ach  in  its  narrow  grave  now  lies,) 
We  hear,  and  not  with  tearless  eyes, 

"  You  might  have  been — you  might  have  been." 

We  might  have  won  the  meed  of  fame, 
Essayed  and  reached  a  worthier  aim — 
Had  more  of  joy  and  less  of  shame, 
Nor  heard,  as  from  a  tongue  of  flame, 

"  You  might  have  been — you  might  have  been." 


SOME  TALK  ABOUT  POETS. 

LAURA. 

Do  tell  me  what's  a  Poet,  ma  ? 

I'm  sure  I  meant  to  please  him, 
But  when  this  morn  I  asked  papa, 

He  told  me  not  to  tease  him  ! 
And  so  does  every  one  I  ask 

So  (of  course)  I  long  to  know  it, 
It  can't  be  such  a  mighty  task 

To  tell  one  what's  a  Poet 


161 


MAMMA. 

You  silly  girl ! — why,  how  absurd 

To  ask  papa  that  question  ! 
I'm  sure  it  was  your  very  word 

That  spoiled  his  day's  digestion  ! 
My  dear,  they're  men  who've  long  annoyed 

All  good  and  prudent  mothers, 
They're  men,  my  love,  you  must  avoid 

As  much  as  younger  brothers  ! 
• 

LAURA. 

But  why,  mamma  ?     You  said,  be  sure, 

And  still  this  precept  carry, 
That  younger  sons  are  always  poor. 

And  very  seldom  marry. 
But  what  on  earth  have  poets  done, 

That  we  should  scorn  and  scout  'em  ? 
And  there's  Letitia  Vane,  for  one, 

I  know  is  crazed  about  'em  ! 

MAMMA. 

Then,  Laura,  I  may  say  at  once 
They  must  be  coldly  treated ! 
They're  poorer  even  than  younger  sons, 

And  dreadfully  conceited. 

8* 


162 

They've  little  gold,  except  it  be 
The  gilding  on  their  covers, 

And  prudent  mothers  all  agree 
They  are  most  dangerous  lovers. 


THE  LAST  MOSQUITO. 

Thou  faintest,  last  mosquito 

With  which  my  room  was  rife ! 
The  frost  has  put  a  veto 

Upon  thy  further  life. 
Though  thou  wert  a  backbiter 

When  June  o'erflushed  the  sky. 
It  is  not  in  the  writer 

To  doom  thee  now  to  die. 

No  more  thy  horn  shall  wake  us — 
The  nights  are  now  too  chill ; 

No  longer  canst  thou  make  us 
The  victims  of  thy  bill ; 


163 

Our  children  we  love  dearly, 
They  are  our  blood  and  line ; 

But  thou,  I  know,  art  nearly 
All  flesh  and  blood  of  mine. 


Alas,  thou  withering  'skeeter  ! 

When  August  yet  was  fresh, 
Perchance  thou  wast  an  eater 

Of  Laura's  roseate  flesh  ! 
That  flesh  of  dazzling  whiteness, 

Too  pure  for  touch  of  mine — 
The  thought  even  lends  a  brightness 

To  this  thy  cold  decline  ! 


We  spread  our  nets  for  fishes, 

To  drag  them  in,  no  d6ubt ; 
With  thee  our  only  wishes 

Were  still  to  keep  thee  out ; 
Full  oft  from  some  ecstatic, 

Bright  dream  recalled,  I  rose — 
And  found  thee  in  the  attic, 

A-fattening  on  my  nose. 


164 

"  But  life  is  fleet— how  fleet,  oh  !" 

As  Mrs.  Norton  sings — 
And  now  thou  last  mosquito 

Dost  spread  thy  witherin  g  wings ! 
Thou  hast  escaped  and  battened 

Thus  late  into  the  fall ; 
Thy  comrades  there  lie  flattened 

And  dead  upon  the  wall. 


'Tis  thus  thy  summer  passes — 

'Twere  well  our  life  so  passed, 
Sweet  flowers,  soft  arms,  full  glasses 

Around  our  pathway  east ! 
But  we  must  bide  the  bitter 

Cold  winters  as  they  come — 
Why,  darq,  the  eternal  critter, 

He  s  bit  me  on  the  thumb  ! 


165 


SPIRIT    RAPPING. 


[Some  lines  on  the  introduction   into   the  Massachusetts  Legislature  of  a 
bill  for  the  "  Suppression  of  Spiritual  Manifestations."] 


'  De  par  le  Hoi !     Defense  a  Dieu 
De  fpire  miracles  en  ce  lieu." 


What !  pass  a  statute  to  dispafth  'em  ! 

It  is  a  proposition  rare  ; 
Imprison. — hang — (when  you  first  catch  'em,) 

The  bodiless  spirits  of  the  air  ! — 
Despise  all  reason, — hear  no  question, — 

The  scourge  of  legal  power  is  thine ; 
Condemn — and  then  ('twill  aid  digestion) 

Say  "  Grace  "  before  you  dine  ! 


n. 


Of  old,  when  glorious  Galileo 

Announced  the  planetary  plan, 
A  Pope, — a  sacerdotal  Leo, 

Declared  hi.s  doctrine  under  ban ; 
But,  though  the  church  affirmed  his  error, 

The  world  has  since  his  truth  averred — 
And,  in  despite  of  condign  terror, 

The  spirits  will  be  heard  ! 


166 


in. 

When  Franklin  raised  his  brawny  arm 

To  rob  the  lightning's  callow  nest, 
(Where  little  thunder  gods  did  swarm 

Beneath  the  electric  mother's  breast :) 
Why  did  no  Yankee  Pope  arise 

To  bid  the  impious  hand  withdraw, 
'  Spreading  an  legis  o'er  the  skies 

Of  Massachusetts  Law  ? 

IV. 

O  Liberty  !  thou  splendid  word, 

We  do  adore  thy  claptrap  name  ! 
'Tis  reverenced  wheresoever  heard, 

But  violated,  just  the  same  ! 
Shall  men  with  narrow  brows  and  hearts 

Forbid  our  spiritual  faith  ? 
"  Rap  !  Rap  !"  from  the  dull  table  starts, 

It  lends  a  spur  to  death  ! 


No !  by  the  hallowed  rights  we  wrung 
In  years  of  blood  from  Britain's  hand — 

No  !  by  the  stars — heaven's  cressets ! — hung 
In  the  blue  dome  that  spans  our  land  ! 


167 


We  will  not  yield  to  fogy  drill, 
We  scorn  and  hate  its  idiot  ban, 

With  force  of  intellect  and  will 
We  claim  the  rights  of  man. 


VI. 


The  right  to  hope,  the  right  to  pray, 

The  right  of  conscience  and  of  rest, 
The  right  to  choose  whatever  way, 

Unhurting  others,  suits  us  best. 
We  re-affirm  in  reverent  awe 

This  heresy  that  Knox  began, 
That  conscience  towers  o'er  human  law, 

That  God  is  more  than,  man  ! 


THE  BROKEN  HEART. 

[From  the  French.] 

Her  heart  was  broken;  day  by  day 

She  wasted  silently  away  ; 

And  o'er  her  large  dark  eyes  there  grew 

A  film  of  leaden-colored  hue  ; 

Her  step  was  languid,  slow  and  weak, 

A  hectic  fever  flushed  her  cheek — 

Seldom  and  little  did  she  speak. 


168 

And  he  to  whom  her  faith  was  vowed, 
Her  husband — by  the  world  allowed 
A  kind,  good-natured,  easy  man — 
O'er  all  his  present  conduct  ran 
To  see  if  he  had  given  her  ought 
To  cause  this  apathy  of  thought — 
This  tearful  silence,  sorrow  fraught ! 

At  length  she  spoke  one  dewy  morn — 

"  Adolphe,  you  wonder  why  forlorn 

I  pensive  sit  from  day  to  day, 

And  pine  in  solitude  away. 

Dear  husband,  I  will  tell  thee  all  : 

My  neighbor,  Madame  D'Argental, 

Has  got — I  have  not — a  new  shawl." 


THE  FIRST  OF  MAY. 

The  first  of  May — the  first  of  May 

What  lying  poet  called  it  gay  ? 
There  is  the  very  deuce  to  pay, 
And  nc  pitch  hot,  the  first  of  May  ! 


169 

The  house  I  took  a  twelvemonth  since, 
And  furnished  fit  to  lodge  a  prince — 
That  cheerful  house  I  quit  to-day, 
Because  it  is  the  first  of  May. 

My  carpets  all  are  torn  to  shreds, 
We  have  not  where  to  lay  our  heads ; 
The  beds  are  all  unscrewed,  and  we 
Are  screwed  a&  tight  a?  men  can  be. 

Our  new  piano — new  no  more — 
In  fragments  lies  upon  the  floor ; 
Our  china  service,  once  so  neat, 
Now  helps  to  pave  the  dusty  street. 

"  Alas  !"  I  cry  in  utter  grief, 
"  Would  Heaven  I  were  an  Arab  chief 
He  roams  about  unrented  places, 
And  camps  in  every  green  oasis." 

The  wagoners  alone  can  say 

The  festival  is  truly  gay  ; 

The  scoundrels  get  a  fortnight's  pay 

For  working  on  the  first  of  May. 


170 


THE   LAST   RESORT. 

A  dramatist  declared  he  had  got 
So  many  people  in  his  plot, 
That  what  do  do  with  half  he  had 
"Was  like  to  drive  him  drama-mad  ! 
"  The  hero  and  the  heroine 
Of  course  are  married — very  fine  ! 
But  with  the  others,  what  to  do 
Is  more  than  I*  can  tell ;  can  you  ?" 

His  friend  replied — "  'Tis  hard  to  say, 
But  yet  I  think  there  is  a  way. 
The  married  couple  thank  their  stars, 
And  half  the  '  others'  take  the  cars ; 
The  other  half  you  put  on  board 
An  Erie  steamboat, — take  my  word. 
They1!!  never  trouble  you  again  !" 
The  dramatist  resumed  his  pen. 


171 


THINE  EYES  OF  BLUE. 

[From  the  French.] 

Thine  eyes  of  blue, — the  heaven's  own  hue, — 
Thy  soft  eyes  thrill  my  fevered  pulse  ; 

The  fire  that  lies  within  thine  eyes 
Hath  blinded  ine  to  all  things  else ! 

Love  at  a  single  word  may  bloom, 
The  full  heart  blossoms  fair  and  free ; 

One  glance  may  gild  the  future's  gloom, 
And  now  thy  bright  eyes  shine  on  me ! 

Thine  eyes  of  blue,  &c. 

And  canst  thou  ask  me  why  my  cheek, 
Where  thou  art  not,  grows  pale  and  wan  ? 

Why  sadness  that  I  cannot  speak 

Surrounds  my  path  when  thou  art  gone  ? 

Thine  eyes  of  blue,  &c. 

And  further  canst  thou  wish  to  know 

What  change  comes  o'er  me  when  we  meet  ? 

And  why  my  pallid  brow  will  glow, 
And  why  my  quivering  pulses  beat  ? 


172 

Thine  eyes  of  blue, — the  heaven's  own  hue  ! 

Thy  soft  eyes  thrill  my  fevered  pulse ; 
The  fire  that  lies  within  thine  eyes 

Hath  blinded  me  to  all  things  else  ! 


THE  THRONE  AND  THE  WORKSHOP. 


[Translated  from  the  French.] 


While  all  the  arts  with  trophies  bright 

To  prove  the  wide  world's  wealth  combine, 

It  seems  as  though  some  genial  sprite 
Had  helped  to  deck  the  Crystal  shrine ! 

n. 

Be  England  long  to  fame  endeared, 
Who — bidding  rival  passions  cease — 

Extends  to  those  she  lately  feared 
The  hand  of  welcome  and  of  peace  ! 


173 


HI. 

To  all  the  world  a  challenge  speeds, 

And  on  her  hospitable  soil, 
To  the  red  strife  of  war  succeeds 

The  bloodless  tilt  of  art  and  toil. 

IV. 

The  lords  of  labor  pile  on  high 

Their  worlds  beneath  the  shining  dome ; 
And  sing  no  longer  "  let  us  die," 

But  "  live  to  bless  our  native  home  !"   . 

v. 

Our  battle-field  a  palace  gay ! 

Our  victor's  robes  unstained  and  white  ! 
The  peaceful  workman  bears  away 

The  cross  of  honor  from  the  fight ! 

VI. 

The  rich,  the  learned,  the  gifted  sons 
Of  art  and  labor  throng  the  hall ; 

A  band  of  brethren,  knit  at  once 

To  bless  the  green  earth,  free  to  all ! 


174 


vn. 


Then,  courage  !     Ceaseless  toil  will  bring 
The  workshop  level  with  the  throne ! 

And  all  the  titles  of  a  king, 

Be  naught  to  that  we  laborers  own  ! 


THE  LAST  APPEAL. 

Brethren,  'tis  the  last  appeal, 

Of  human  woe  to  outraged  Heaven ! 
God  witness  for  us,  that  we  feel 
.Reluctant  all  to  draw  the  steel ! 
But  what  hope  else  to  us  is  given  ? 
The  bonds  of  social  concord  riven, 
We  try  the  last  appeal ! 

Brethren,  on  !  one  stubborn  fight, 

And  peace  for  evermore  shall  be  ! 

The  Red  Sea's  waves  will  soon  unite, 
Above  the  vanquished  hosts  of  Might ; 

And  conquest  lead  us  into  thee, 

Sweet  Canaan  of  liberty, 

Where  God  protects  the  Right ! 


175 


Brethren !     Power's  triumphant  heel 

Hath  struck  us  oft ;  but  now  we  turn  ! 
And  they  who  wronged  us  soon  shall  feel 
The  spell  that  lurks  in  patriot  zeal, 

Their  bonds  to  break,  their  threats  to  spurn- 
The  victor's  wreath,  or  martyr's  urn, 
Await  the  Last  Appeal ! 


A  PUNGENT  CONSIDERATION. 


Of  all  the  trades  that  men  can  call 

Unpleasant  and  offensive, 
The  Editor's  is  worst  of  all, 

For  he  is  ever  pensive; 
His  leaders  lead  to  nothing  high — 

His  columns  are  unstable, 
And  though  the  printers  make  him  pi, 

It  does  not  suit  his  table. 


176 


ii. 

The  Carpenter, — his  course  is  plane, 

His  bit  is  always  near  him — 
He  augurs  every  hour  of  gsin, — 

He  chisels — and  none  jeer  him. 
He  shaves,  yet  is  not  close,  they  say,- 

The  public  pay  his  board,  sir, 
Full  of  wise  saws,  he  bores  away, 

And  so  he  swells  his  hoard,  sir. 

in. 

St.  Crispin's  son — the  man  of  shoes, 

Has  awl  things  at  control,  sir ; 
He  waxes  wealthy  in  his  views, 

But  ne'er  neglects  his  sole,  sir. 
His  is  indeed  a  heeling  trade, 

And  when  we  come  to  casting 
The  toetal  profits  he  has  made, 

We  find  hia  ends  are  lasting. 

IV. 

The  Tailor,  too,  gives  fits  to  all, 

Yet  never  gets  a  basting ; 
His  cabbages,  however  small, 

Are  most  delicious  tasting. 


177 

His  goose  is  heated — (happy  prig  !) 
Unstinted  is  his  measure  ; 

He  always  plays  at  thimblerig, 
And  seams  a  man  of  pleasure. 

v.  • 

The  Farmer  reaps  a  fortune  plump, 

Though  harrowed  far  from  woe,  sir 
His  spade  for  ever  proves  a  trump, 

His  book  is  Fve-an-hoe,  sir ; 
However  corned,  he  does  not  slip, 

Though  husky,  never  hoarse,  sir, 
And  in  a  plow-share  partnership, 

He  gets  his  share,  of  course,  sir. 

VI. 

The  Sailor  on  the  giddy  mast, 

(Comparatively  master,) 
Has  many  a  bulwark  round  him  cast 

To  wave  away  disaster. 
Even  shrouds  to  him  are  full  of  life, 

His  mainstay  still  is  o'er  him, 
A  gallant  and  top-gallant  crew 

Of  beaux  esprits  before  him. 
9 


178 


VII. 

The  sturdy  Irish  Laborer  picks 

And  climbs  to  fame  ; — 'tis  funny, 
He  deals  with  none  but  regular  bricks, 

And  so  he  pockets  money. 
One  friend  sticks  to  him, — (mortar  'tis),- 

In  hodden  gray,  unbaifled, 
He  leaves  below  an  honest  name 

When  he  ascends  the  scaffold. 

VIII. 

The  Printer,  though  his  case  be  hard, 

Yet  sticks  not  at  his  hap,  sir ; 
'Tis  his  to  canonize  the  bard, 

And  trim  a  Roman  cap,  sir. 
Some  go  two-forty, — -what  of  that  ? 

He  goes  it  by  the  thousand  ! 
A  man  of  form  and  fond  of  fat, 

He  loves  the  song  I  now  send. 

IX. 

The  Engine-driver,  if  we  track 
His  outward  semblance  deeper, 

Has  got  some  very  tender  traits — 
He  ne'er  disturbs  the  sleeper. 


179 

And  when  you  switch  him  as  he  goes, 

He  whistles  all  the  louder ; 
And  should  you  brake  him  on  the  wheel, 

It  only  makes  him  prouder. 

x. 

I  launched  this  skiff  of  rhyme  upon 

The  trade-winds  of  the  muses ; 
Through  pungent  seas  they've  borne  it  on, 

The  boat  no  rudder  uses : 
So  masticate  its  meaning  once, 

And  judge  not  sternly  of  it — 
You'll  find  a  freight  of  little  puns, 

And  very  little  profit. 


NEW-YORK    CRYSTAL    PALACE. 


Ye  wha  direct  the  Exhibition, 
An'  manage  a'  things  wi  precision, 
Mock  na  a  simple  bard's  petition, 

Wha's  pouch  is  bare, 
An'  yet  wad  like  to  feast  his  vision 

On  yon  big  Fair. 


180 


n. 

'Tis  true  I'm  but  a  poortith  wight, 
Come  here  to  warstle  and  to  fight, 
For  roof  and  hearth,  for  claes  an'  bite, 

My  voice  is  sma', 
But  no  afeard  to  crack  the  right 

Afore  ye  a'. 

in. 

Though  fifty  cents  be  sma'  to  you, 
A  mere  card-counter,  like  eneugh, 
There's  mony  an  honest  lad  wad  rue 

That  sma'  amount ; 
His  childrens'  bellies  maun  be  fou', 

An'  trifles  count. 

IV. 

If  yon  were  like  a  kintra  show, 

To  which  but  aince  we  spier  to  go? 

Your  bonnie  charge,  though  far  frae  low, 

I  wad  na  shun ; 
I'd  in,  and  tak  the  foremost  row, 

An'  see  the  fun. 


181 


.    v. 

But  your's  is  nae  sic  feckless  play 
That  ane  can  ken  it  in  a  day, 
Unless  in  a  bewildered  way 

He  gapes  an'  glowers ; — 
Sic  wark  demands  and  wad  repay 

Sax  score  of  hours. 

VI. 

An'  how,  I  ask,  can  chiels  afford, 
Wha's  gains  are  sma',  an'  labor  hard, 
A  muckle  sum  that  should  be  shared 

Wi'  his  wee  bodies  ? 
I'm  feard  they'd  lack  for  bed  and  board, 

An'  shoes  and  duddies. 

VII. 

For  bye,  in  an  industrial  tilt, 
Though  ither  flags  be  bonnier  gilt, 
Wha's  banner  should  gang  first  in  till't 

Unless  of  those 
Wha's  joints  hae  cracked,  wha's  sweat  was  spilt, 

Afore  it  rose  ? 


182 


VIII. 

• 

What  hae  the  rich,  the  dizzened  crowd, 
In  a'  the  place  to  mak  them  proud  ? 
They  neither  welded,  wove,  nor  plow'd, 

Nor  bleart  their  eyne — 
Whyles  Labor  may  proclaim  aloud, 

"  The  work  is  mine  ! 


IX. 


"  Frae  deep  foundation  e'en  to  dome, 
The  glit'rin'  aisles  through  which  you  roam, 
The  gallery  that,  light  as  foam, 

Ower  a'  expands, 
The  palace  and  its  treasures  come 
Frae  these  rough  hands  !" 

x. 

Let  Sedgwick  now  (a  sonsy  man) 

Tell  the  Directors  o'  his  plan, 

An'  say,  "  Though  wrangly  we  began, 

'Tis  time  to  truckle; 
A  thousand  mickle  soon  outrun 

The  five-score  muckle." 


183 

XT. 

Here  folk  frae  ilka  clime  are  met, 
A  wae-disposed  monarchic  set, 
A1  peering  round,  if  they  can  get 

(Lang  may  they  need  them  !) 
Some  proofs  to  say  that  "  Labor  yet 

Wins  nocht  frae  freedom." 

xn. 

Ye  may  despise  us,  an'  ye  will, 
But  we're  the  men  to  foot  your  bill ; 
The  "  Upper  Ten  "  hae  looked  their  fill, 

An  should  you  flout  us, 
I'm  feard  ye'll  hae  an  empty  till 

At  best  without  us. 

XIII. 

An'  what  for  no  should  we  na'  rin 
(Some  points  demand  it)  out  an'  in? 
The  stummochs  o'  us  working  men 

Are  easy  snarling,' 
But  ower  the  whirligig  we  grin 

Like  Sternie's  Starling. 


184 


XIV, 

Let  Sedgwick  tak  anither  thought  I 
Kickshaws  to  labor's  wame  are  naught, 
Nor  can  we  pay  the  prices  sought 

By  those  bright  lasses 
Frae  whom,  mysel'  yestreen  >  I  bought 

Twa  jelly  glasses. 

xv. 

Dupont  anr  Davis — soldiers  baith — 

I  swear  till  ye,  upon  my  aith, 

That  though  ye  aft  hae  grappled  death, 

Wi  sabres  earvin', 
Ye  wad  na  bide  the  risinT  wrath 

0'  downright  starviiiT. 

XVI. 

I'm  done; — nor  care  I  now  a  flee, 
If  high  or  low  you  gar  it  be  ; 
But  this  I  swear,  nae  doit  frae  me 

Your  nieves  shall  mortar 
Till  into  yon  big  house  the  key 

Is  "  cash — one  quarter  !" 


185 


TRUTH  IN  PARENTHESIS. 

I  love — O  more  than  words  can  tell, 

(Your  five-and-thirty  thousand  shiners,) 
You  draw  me  by  a  nameless  spell, 

(As  California  draws  the  miners.) 
You  are  so  rich  in  beauty's  dower, 

(And  rich  in  several  ways  beside  it,) 
Had  I  your  hand  within  my  power, 

(Across  a  banker's  draft  to  guide  it,) 
No  care  my  future  life  could  dim — 
(My  tailor,  too  !  what  joy  to  him  !) 


0.  should  you  change  your  name  for  mine, 

(I've  given  my  name — on  bills — to  twenty,) 
Existence  were  a  dream  divine, 

(At  least  so  long  as  cash  was  plenty.) 
Our  home  should  be  a  sylvan  grot, 

(Bath,  billiard,  smoking-room  and  larder,) 
And  there,  forgetting  and  forgot, 

(My  present  need  I'd  live  the  harder ;) 
Our  days  should  pass  in  fresh  delights, 
(Lethargic  days  and  roaring  nights.) 


186 

0  say,  my  young,  my  fawn-line  girl, 
(She's  old  enough  to  be  my  mother,) 

Let  "yes  "  o'erleap  those  gates  of  pearl! 

(My  laughter  it  is  hard  to  smother;) 
Let  lips  that  love  hath  formed  for  joy, 

(For  joy,  if  they  her  purse  resign  me,) 
Long  hesitate  ere  they  destroy, 

(And  to  a  debtor's  jail  consign  me,) 
The  heart  that  beats  but  to  adore 
(Yourself  the  less,  your  fortune  more.) 

Consent — consent,  my  priceless  love, 
(Her  price  is  five-and-thirty  thousand,) 

1  swear  by  all,  around,  above, 

(Her  purse-strings  now,  I  feel,  are  loosened,) 
I  have  not  loved  you  for  your  wealth, 

(Nor  loved  at  all,  as  I'm  a  sinner;) 
0  bliss  !  you  yield,  one  kiss  by  stealth  ! 

(I'm  sick — that  kiss  has  spoiled  my  dinner;) 
Now  early  name  the  blissful  day, 
(My  duns  grow  clamorous^for  their  pay.) 


187 


ORIGIN  OF  THE   HAIR  CHAIN. 


Love  went  one  day  a  foolish  quest; 

He  could  not  rest. 
But  wandered  idly  to  and  fro 

In  deepest  woe 
And  wrung  his  hands,  as  if  in  pain, 

And  cried  "  A  chain  ! 
I  need  a  subtle  chain  to  bind, 

A  captive  mind  ! 
A  captive  heart  I  seek  to  bind, 
Yet  thrall  nor  bonds  nor  fetters  find  !" 


Old  Hymen  hobbled  from  the  church, 

And  in  the  porch, 
Cried,  "  Hither !  I  have  chains  to  sell 

Will  please  you  well ! 
Once  bound  in  my  law-hallowed  chain 

None  ever  gain, 
Except  by  death,  their  liberty ! 

Step  in  and  see 

The  spells  o'er  which  I  glibly  run 
To  bind  two  faithful  hearts  in  one !" 


188 

"  Your  spells  are  vain !"  the  god  replied, 

"  They  have  been  tried  ; 
I  need  an  ever-dining  thrall, 

Not  one  to  gall ! 
You  bind  the  purse — you  bind  the  hand, 

In  ceaseless  band  ! 
The  thoughts,  affections,  all  I  try 

To  knit  for  aye, 

You  cannot  bind.     I  would  rather  lose 
My  captive,  than  such  bondage  use  1" 

Then  Yenus  came,  and  found  the  child 

Distraught  and  wild ; 
And  still  he  wandered  to  and  fro, 

In  deepest  woe, 
And  wrung  his  hands  in  hopeless  pain, 

And  cried,  "  A  chain  ! 
I  need  a  subtle  chain  to  bind 

A  captive  mind; 
A  captive  heart  I  seek  to  bind 
Yet  thrall,  nor  bonds,  nor  fetters  find !" 

Her  dark  hair  o'er  her  bosom  flowing, 

(That  bosom  glowing 
With  tenderest  thoughts  !)  the  goddess  smiled, 

And  kissed  the  child. 


189 

She  stilled  his  sobs  with  fond  caress, 

And  chose  a  tress — 
A  long  dark  tress  that  fell  below 

Her  breast  of  snow. 
"  Weave  this  into  a  chain  my  child !" 
The  urchin  kissed  her  hand  and  smiled. 

And  now  in  young  Love's  myrtle  bower, 

For  many  an  hour, 
The  Graces  ply  their  pleasing  task — 

And  should  you  ask 
What  young  Love  did,  he  quickly  rolled, 

Of  virgin  gold, 
A  love-knot  for  the  woven  chain, 

Nor  toiled  in  vain  ! 
For  in  that  glittering  bondage  ta'en 
The  captive  smiled,  and  kissed  his  chain. 


MAXIMS  OF  THE  NEWSPAPER, 

i. 

A  paragraph  to  make  one  laugh, 
Should  be  of  ten  lines  just  a  half; 
A  trivial  theme, — a  brilliant  stream 
Of  verbiage,  metaphor  and  dream,— » 
Such  as  this  paragraph  I  deem  ! 


190 


ii. 

A  stirring  song  is  never  long, 
But  must  be  fiery,  deep  and  strong ; 
With  much  of  thought,  not  fully  wrought, 
But  in  dim  glimpses  shown  and  caught ; 
Such  are  the  rules  Anacreon  taught. 

in. 

A  good  critique  should  ever  seek 

To  check  the  proud,  and  help  the  weak ; 

Not  swayed  by  fame,  nor  prone  to  blame, 

Calm,  energetic,  never  tame, 

And  judging  all  men  just  the  same. 


A  tale  or  sketch  should  never  fetch 
Its  hero  from  thy  hand.  Jack  Ketch ; 
Though  for  a  time  the  tide  of  crime 
Roll  down  white-crested  and  sublime, 
It  leaves  a  track  of  venomed  slirne. 

v. 

In  short,  be  brief! — each  added  leaf 
Is  so  much  to  your  reader's  grief, 
The  point  is  gone :  the  lightning  shone 
And  dies  while  yet  we  labor  on ; 
True  wit  ne'er  knows  a  second  dawn ! 


191 


VI. 


Observe  these  rules,  and  mock  the  "  Schools 
Of  composition"  taught  by  fools  ! 
Briefness  and  wit  together  flit, 
And  fly,  like  Parthians,  when  they  hit — 
The  urchins  are  too  wise  to  sit. 


ADIEU. 

0  !  heed  him  not,  if  poet  prate 

Of  parted  love  and  endless  woe ; 

True  love  would  scorn  to  babble  so 
And  grief  is  inarticulate  ; 

Or  with  a  hoarse  and  broken  flow 
It  rushes,  murrauf  ing,  to  its  fate  ; 
That  ocean  which,  or  soon  or  late, 

Receives  the  wreck  of  all  we  know, 
Or  be  it -love,  or  be  it  hate. 
O  heed  him  not !     The  spirit  bowed 
With  grief  like  mine  was  ne'er  so  loud! 


192 

But  if  to  say  in  simple  phrase 

That  I  will  ne'er  forget  you,  friends, 
Though  at  the  earth's  remotest  ends 
I  pass  my  long  unsolaced  days  ; 

That  when  the  evening  shade  descends, 
And  high  and  bright  the  fagots  blaze, 
My  faithful  heart  your  forms  shall  raise, 

While  memory  the  curtain  rends 
That  time  would  drop  o'er  earlier  days — 
If  this  content  you,  'tis  sincere, 
Though  vouched  by  neither  oath  nor  tear. 


THE  CRUSADER  SONG. 

[From  the  Russian.] 
I. 

Before  the  Holy  linage 

I  thrice  have  bent  to-night, 
And,  having  paid  my  orisons, 

Now  rush  to  join  the  fight — 
The  fight  of  faith  and  fatherland, 

For  this  I  rush  afar, 
My  life  and  lance  for  Russia ! 

My  fealty  to  the  Czar ! 


193 


ii. 

My  sword — the  only  heritage 

My  valiant  fathers  left, 
Hath  bit  the  flesh  of  Sweden, 

And  many  a  Tartar  cleft ; 
Too  long  in  shameful  idleness 

The  rusting  blade  hath  lain, 
And  now  it  longs  for  blood  to  cleanse 

The  dull,  corroding  stain  ! 

in. 

From  the  summit  of  the  Balkan 

Our  brethren  stretch  their  hands  ; 
They  pray  to  us  to  rescue  them — 

Their  prayers  become  commands  ! 
We  feel  for  them,  will  fight  for  them, 

For  God  and  us  they  bleed ; 
The  weaponed  strength  of  Russia  goes 

To  strike  for  Russia's  creed ! 

iv. 

The  memories  of  our  church  are  twined 
Round  Kiew's  white-bastioned  crest — 

The  loveliest  and  the  brightest  town 
That  ever  Turk  oppressed. 


194 

Those  memories  are  consecrate, 
And  shadow  forth  the  doom 

"Which  gathers  strength  in  silence, 
And  will  quickly  burst  the  gloom. 

v. 

The  cross  of  pain,  the  spear  of  might, 

On  these  our  strength  we  cast ; 
The  hand  of  Grod  protected  both 

In  ages  long  o'erpast. 
Think  you  our  hearts  so  soon  forget 

The  sires  for  whom  we  mourn  ? 
Their  sons  shall  bear  the  flag  of  faith 

As  it  by  them  was  borne. 

VI. 

We  go  to  break  the  Moslem's  pride, 

To  crush  his  creed  accursed — 
Then  welcome  be  the  Holy  War, 

And  let  its  tempest  burst ! 
Be  this  our  victor  battle  cry, 

As  east  and  south  we  press — 
"  The  God  that  blesses  Russia, 

And  the  Czar  the  Russians  bless!" 


195 


SONNETS. 

OX  READING  THE 

Grandest  and  best  of  all  the  motley  train 
That  hail  old  Fiction  as  their  deathless  sire  ! 
How  cold  beside  thy  Asiatic  fire, 
Are  all  creations  of  the  northern  brain ! 
Dull,  leaden  pictures  of  experienced  pain, 
And  pulseless  love-tales  over  which  we  tire  ! 
Whoso  possesseth  thee  does  not  require 
This  world  at  all — for,  on  thy  page,  we  gain 
A  lovelier  earth,  a  loftier  life  than  ours, 

Full  of  good  Genii,  Mermaids,  and  the  Moon, 
Affrites  and  Fairies,  prompt  to  every  boon, 
Fountains  and  gems,  and  broidered  robes  and  flowers, 
And  diamond  gates  that  hinge  in  golden  towers, 
And  love  at  dewy  ease  in  paradisal  bowers  ! 


The  garden  flower-stalks,  black  and  pinched  with  cold, 
The  wood-path  strewn  with  red  and  yellow  leaves, 
And  the  hoarse  murmur  which  the  tempest  weaves 

Through  the  bare  branches, — as  though  Autumn  told 


196 


With  groans  the  agony  of  growing  old 

And  dying  poor  and  naked.     Nature  grieves 
That  the  brief  gleam  of  sunshine  so  deceives, 
When,  for  an  hour  at  noon,  the  clouds  unfold 
And  show  the  Day-God, — bright,  no  longer  warm, 
Luring  each  shivering  insect  coyly  forth 
With  the  glad  hope  of  Summer's  second  birth, 
A  hope,  alas  !  soon  rifled  by  the  storm ! 
The  birds  with  shriller  note  foretell  the  dearth 
Now  hovering  in  the  clouds  o'er  the  late  smiling  earth  ! 


TO  HELEN A    POETESS. 

We  ne'er  have  met  in  the  world's  busy  throng, 
And  in  the  world  'tis  chance  if  e'er  we  meet ; 
Yet  in  the  shadow  of  the  woods  'tis  sweet, 

Even  though  we  know  not  whence,  to  hear  the  song 

Of  the  wild  robin,  as  her  notes  prolong 
The  hymn  of  joy  ! — or  in  the  lonely  glen, 
Moonlit,  and  far  from  the  abodes  of  men, 

To  list  the  streamlet  as  it  chafes  along 

Its  bright  and  winding  course  thro'  summer  flowers, 

Old  moss-grown  rocks  and  interlacing  roots, 

Where  scarce  a  ray  through  the  thick  foliage  shoots 


197 


Down  to  the  tide,  and  the  entangled  bowers 
Of  sedge  and  lily  !     Thus  entranced  I  hear 
The  minstrel  still  unknown,  her  utterance  sweet  and 
clear. 


TO    BENJAMIN    B.    SHILLABER. 
(A  Moon  Sonnet.) 

Around  the  sun  the  earth  has  but  half  sped 
Since  first  I  saw  thee ;  yet  it  almost  seems 
As  if  I  must  have  met  thee  in  the  dreams 

That  long  ago  ran  riot  through  my  head. 

If  all  were  true  Pythagoras  once  said, 

Then  would  I  say, — In  yon  fair  planet's  beams 
Our  souls  had  mingled  like  two  kindred  streams, 

And  parted  thence,  in  different  channels  led, 

Down  to  this  ocean  of  the  present  earth ; 
You  in  New  England  first,  and  elsewhere  I, 
Leaped  out  of  darkness,  and  beheld  the  sky, 

Through  the  thick  vapors  of  our  human  birth ; . 

Then, — by  some  hidden  sympathy  controlled, 

Our  streams  of  life  converged,  and  were  together 
rolled ! 


198 


TO    A    LADY    EDITOR. 

Welcome,  dear  Helen,  to  the  reverend  chair, 
From  which  we  pen  these  rhapsodies  of  ours  ! 
Though  not  so  lovely  as  the  muses'  bowers, 
Nor  quite  exempted  from  life's  wear  and  tear, 
(As  every  earthly  rose  a  thorn  must  bear !) 
Still  let  us  hope  that  you  will  find  the  flowers 
More  thickly  scattered.     On  the  loftiest  towers 
The  storm  strikes  fiercest ;  but  a  purer  air 
Plays  round  the  pinnacle ;  and  standing  there, 
A  wider  landscape  animates  our  powers, 
Sun-bright,  and  green,  and  freshened  by  the  showers, 
A  larger  life  and  wider  view  we  share  ! 
Heaven's  breath,  if  keen,  is  pure ;  and  they  who  dare 
The  empyrean  height  avoid  the  low-born  fogs  of  care. 

TO    A    FOUNTAIN 
That  played  only  during  the  daytime  in  summer. 

•  Green-wooded  fountain  !  with  how  glad  a  rush 
Thou  leapest  up  from  the  surrounding  clay, 
Cleaving  toward  heaven  thy  rainbow-colored  way, 
And  gleaming  brightly  in  the  crimson  flush 
Spread  o'er  the  west.     Anon,  the  starry  hush 
Of  night  will  lull  thee,  and  thy  drifted  spray 
No  more  shall  fall,  like  an  alighting  fay, 


199 


On  the  dry  leaves  now  revelling  in  thy  gush  ! 
Say,  friends,  if  love's  rich  fountain  e'er  shall  fail 
To  fling  its  freshening  waters  from  the  heart, 
In  sorrow's  night  shall  its  loud  tide  depart, 
And  its  bright  plumage  cease  to  fan  the  gale  ? 
Shall  we  who  shared  its  noontide  ever  know 
That  Love,  like  it,  alas !  has  but  a  summer  flow  ? 


SPIRITUAL    MANIFESTATIONS. 

It  seems  as  if  the  veil  were  rent  atwain 

Which  hid  the  future  from  the  present  world  ; 
While  from  the  deep  abyss  before  are  hurled 
Swift  beams  of  light  into  this  waste  of  pain 
Which  men  call  life.     It  may  be  that  in  vain 
We  hear  the  spirit  voices  of  the  past 
Rise  out  of  chaos,  tremulous  and  fast, 
To  fall  on  the  sick  soul  like  summer  rain. 
But,  if  delusion,  it  is  yet  so  sweet 

To  think  the  perished  live  in  higher  spheres 
And  share  with  us  our  earthly  hopes  and  fears, 
That  I,  for  one,  will  cherish  the  deceit, 
And  say  to  those  who  chide  me  for  my  faith — 
Peace  for  a  few  short  years !  all  will  be  known  in  death. 


200 


THE   BACCHANTE. 

Say,  art  thou  sad  ? — my  golden  cup 

With  precious  balm  is  laden ; 
A  world  of  joy  in  every  drop, 

For  man,  and,  eke,  for  maiden. 
Its  scent  outvies  the  rosy  ties 

That  in  my  tresses  cluster ; 
The  light  that  lies  within  mine  eyes 

Grows  pale  beside  its  lustre  ! 

My  zone  ungirt,  my  bosom  warm, 

My  thoughts  at  random  roaming — 
Wilt  thou  refuse  the  fragrant  charm  ? 

Wilt  thou  refuse  it  foaming  ? 
Its  scent  outvies  the  rosy  ties 

That  in  my  tresses  cluster  ; 
The  light  that  lies  within  mine  eyes 

Grows  pale  beside  its  lustre! 


201 


THE    MINER'S   DREAM. 

I  lie,  all  cold  and  lonely, 

Beneath  an  elm  at  night, 
When  the  stars  are  shining  only 

And  the  glowworm  twinkles  bright ; 
I  sleep  where  the  star-gleams  quiver, 

And  my  restless  memories  roam 
Away  from  the  golden  rh  er, 

To  my  boyhood's  happy  home! 

The  golden  dream  is  fleeting 

Away  from  my  troubled  sight, 
And  my  heart  with  hope  is  beating, 

As  I  see  the  cottage  light  j 
My  father's  cot  before  me, 

Where  in  bygone  hours  I  dwelt, 
Ere  the  clouds  of  life  came  o'er  me, 

When  no  pain  my  bosom  felt. 

I  see  my  mother  smiling, 
With  a  faint,  uneasy  mirth, 

And  my  father's  hands  are  piling 
The  fagots  on  the  hearth ; 
10 


202 

And  they  whisper  ever  lowly, 
And  I  think  I  hear  my  name — 

tt  was  breathed  in  accents  holy, 
And  a  teardrop  with  it  came  ! 

The  golden  sands  are  gleaming 

In  the  ruddy  flush  of  dawn, 
The  golden  sun  is  beaming, 

And  my  nightly  dream  is  gone  ; 
But  ever  and  for  ever 

In  my  sleep  my  wild  thoughts  roam 
Away  from  the  golden  river, 

To  my  boyhood's  happy  home  ! 


ALAS,   THEY   MET! 

Alas  !  they  met  ere  life  had  lost 

One  tinge  of  summer's  ruddy  morn  ! 
Ere  yet  a  cloud  their  heaven  had  crossed, 

Ere  yet  their  path  had  known  a  thorn  ! 
And,  hand  in  hand,  they  wandered  on, 

Or  stayed  but  to  collect  the  flowers, 
Love's  light  o'er  all  the  future  shone, 

And  Pleasure  led  the  smiling  hours ! 


203 


O,  well  for  them  if  from  that  dream 

Of  bliss  their  spirits  ne'er  had  woken  ! 
If  they  had  sunk  beneath  the  stream 

Of  life,  that  heavenly  trance  unbroken  ! 
They  should  have  died  ere  sorrow  came, 

In  Death's  dark  house,  as  here,  united,  - 
And  quitted  earth  ere  sin  or  shame 

One  leaf  of  Love's  pure  wreath  had  blighted  ! 


FEMININE    ARITHMETIC. 

[A  very  old  "Joe."] 
LAURA. 

On  me  he  shall  ne'er  put  a  ring, 

So,  mamma,  'tis  in  vain  to  take  trouble — 
For  I  was  but  eighteen  in  spring, 

While  his  age  exactly  is  double. 

MAMMA. 

He's  but  in  his  thirty-sixth  year, 

Tall,  handsome,  good-natured  and  witty, 

And  should  you  refuse  him,  my  dear, 
May  you  die  an  old  maid  without  pity ! 


204 


L  AURA. 


His  figure,  I  grant  you,  will  pass, 

And  at  present  he's  young  enough  plenty ; 
But  when  I  am  sixty,  alas ! 

Will  not  he  be  a  hundred  and  twenty  ? 


ROMEO  AND  JULIET. 

JULIET. 

One  kiss  before  you  go,  love, 

One  kiss  before  we  part ! 
Indeed,  you  do  not  know,  love, 

The  sadness  of  my  heart ! 
The  dawn  that  wakes  the  birds,  love, 

To  joy,  is  pain  to  me  ! 
I  hear  your  farewell  words,  love, 

Nor  care  how  bright  it  be  ! 

Oh  !  softly  down  the  stream,  love, 
Let  your  light  oars  be  driven ; 

For  I  have  dreamt  a  dream,  love, 
Perchance  a  warning  given ; 


205 


I  dreamt  my  brother  stood,  love, 
And  saw  our  parting  kiss 

It  cannot  bode  us  good,  love, 
Be  sure,  forget  not  this ! 


Nor  must  thou  yet  forget,  love, 

At  night-fall  to  return, 
When  o'er  the  parapet,  love, 

You  see  the  signal  burn  ; 
Adieu  !  we  may  not  stay,  love, 

Cease  not  to  think  of  me  ! 
And  through  the  weary  day,  love, 

I'll  pray  for  night  and  thee. 


ROMEO. 


0  hush  !  your  fears  are  vain,  love, 

Nor  sire,  nor  brother  near, 
Indeed  I  may  remain,  love, 

There  is  no  danger  here  ! 
The  prying  (lawn  delays,  love, 

As  loth  to  break  our  bliss, 
He  did  but  peep  to  win  from  thee, 

The  fond,  the  parting  kiss  ! 


206 

The  willows,  bending  deep,  love, 

In  prudent  awe  look  down, 
They  will  not  raise  their  heads  to  peep, 

Lest  you,  my  love,  should  frown ; 
The  birds  are  all  asleep,  love, 

Oh,  chide  not  niy  delay  ! 
For  where  thou  art  not  is  my  night — 

Where'er  thou  art  my  day. 

Alas  !  the  spell  is  riven,  love, 

I  hear  the  bells  afar, 
Dost  thou  not  see  in  heaven,  love, 

Yon  dimly  fading  star  ? 
When  in  the  dewy  eve,  love, 

It  rises  o'er  the  hill, 
You'll  see  my  shallop  on  the  stream 

And  hear  my  bugle  shrill. 

Adieu !     It  is  the  dawn,  love, 

I  must — I  must  away  ! 
The  fading  star  hath  gone,  love, 

The  birds  awake  the  day  : 
To  part  at  all  is  pain,  love, 

To  thee  and  me,  I  wis, 
But  till  we  meet  again,  love, 

O,  keep  my  parting  kiss  ! 


207 


THE  MUSHROOM  HUNT. 


In  early  days,  ere  Common  Sense 

And  Genius  had  in  anger  parted, 
They  made  to  friendship  some  pretence, 

Though  each,  Heaven  knows  !  diversely  hearted. 
To  hunt  for  mushrooms  once  they  went, 

Through  nibbled  sheep  walks  straying  onward, 
Sense  with  his  dull  eyes  earthward  bent, 

While  Genius  shot  his  glances  sunward  ! 


Away  they  go !     On  roll  the  hours, 

And  towards  the  west  the  day-god  edges ; 
See  !  Genius  holds  a  wreath  of  flowers, 

Fresh  culled  from  all  the  neighboring  hedges  ! 
Alas  !  ere  eve  their  bright  hues  flit, 

While  Common  Sense  (whom  I  so  doat  on !) 
Thanked  God  "that  he  had  little  wit," 

And  drank  his  ketchup  with  his  mutton. 


208 


THE  TURQUOIS  BROOCH. 


They  tell  us  of  a  preeions  stone 

Which  changes  with  the  wearer. 
And,  moved  by  sympathy  alone, 

Grows  lustreless  or  fairer. 
Thus,  if  the  loved  one's  bosom  grieve, 

Its  azure  glory  flies, 
But  if  to  joy  that  bosom  heave, 

'Tis  bright  as  summer  skies. 


So,  Laura,  is  my  soul  to  thee, 

By  thee  illumed  or  saddened, 
O'ercast  if  thou  look'st  moodily, 

And  bright  if  thou  art  gladdened. 
Thus,  like  the  turquois  to  my  pain, 

Unlike  to  my  unrest, 
For,  Laura,  thou  hast  never  ta'en 

My  spirit  to  thy  breast. 


209 


LINES 


On  reading  in  the  Daily  Times  that  "  Louis  Napoleon  spends  his  even 
ings  either  playing  backgammon  with  the  Empress,  or  examining  the 
private  reports  of  the  Chief  of  Police." 


Spirit  of  him  who  drove  afar 

Rebellion's  hydra-headed  brood, 
And  quenched  the  torch  of  civil  war 

In  tides  of  foreign  blood  ! 
Thou,  in  whose  ears  the  dying  groans 

Of  old  Tradition  ever  sounded  ! 
Thou,  at  whose  step  the  reeling  thrones 

Of  Europe  fell,  confounded  ! 


Spirit  of  him,  whose  mind  did  forge 
At  once  the  weapon  and  the  chain — 

The  prince  of  princes,  and  the  scourge 
Of  all  who  were  too  weak  to  reign  ; 

Behold  this  jackal  of  renown, 

Who  from  your  name  its  glory  snatches  ! 

This  mannikin  beneath  your  crown, — 

This  "king  of  shreds  and  patches  !" 
10* 


210 

France  weeps  beneath  the  idiot  sway 

Of  shaveling  priests  and  jeweled  fools ; 
The  cross  of  honor  is  the  pay 

For  Tyranny's  most  abject  tools. 
The  land  that  couched  the  freest  lance 

Now  fears  the  mformer's  sightless  arrow ; 
The  eagle  of  imperial  France 

Has  dwindled  to  a  sparrow  ! 

And  he,  who  staggered  to  a  throne 

Through  broken  oaths  and  civic  broil, 
Who  sought  his  perjury  to  atone 

By  drenching  red  the  Roman  soil ; 
This  dwarf,  tricked  out  with  seven-league  boots, 

This  king  of  thimble-rigging  science — 
This  rat  who  gnaws  the  hoarded  fruits, 

Designed  to  foster  lions  : 

This  perjurer,  robber,  murderer,  all, 

Religion's  curse  and  manhood's  jibe, 
Whose  only  battle  is  a  ball, 

Whose  only  victory  is  a  bribe — 
This  rushlight  that  would  be  a  star 

(0  Jupiter  !  immortal  Ammon  !) 
Foregoes  the  glorious  game  of  war 

For  one  of  mild  backgammon. 


211 

His  bulletins,  police  reports, 

His  aide-de-camp,  the  mousing  spy- 
Falsehood  the  passport  to  his  courts, 

His  life  one  long-continued  lie ; 
And  this  was  all  the  First  did  win, 

By  Titan  toil  and  daily  battles ; 
And  such  "  the  pea  that  now  within 

The  giant's  helmet  rattles !" 


A    MAINE-LAW    LYRIC. 

With  thickest  growth  of  beard  his  face] 

Was  matted  in  a  ghastly  smile; 
His  hat  preserved  the  faintest  trace 
Of  what  was  once  a  shapely  tile ; 
His  elbows  glimmered  through  his  coat, 
His  trowsers  needed  tailor's  care, 
His  boots  they  were  not  of  a  pair, 
And  through  them  you  his  toes  might  note. 
He  only  said,  "  It  is  the  tipple, 

The  tipple  'tis,"  he  said ; 
He  murmured,  "  Go  it  like  a  cripple, 
And  go  it  'till  you  're  dead  !" 


212 


He  raised  his  hand  at  dewy  morn, 
He  raised  it  far  into  the  night. 
And,  in  a  tone  of  maudling  scorn, 

The  temperance  party  he  would  slight. 
He  drank  his  glass  and  called  for  more, 
With  trembling  fingers  searching  out 
For  dimes  within  the  tattered  clout, 
Which  once  the  name  of  pocket  bore. 

He  only  said, "  It  is  the  tipple, 

The  tipple  'tis,"  he  said  ; 
He  murmured,  "  Go  it  like  a  cripple, 
And  go  it  'till  you  're  dead  !" 

Oft  in  the  middle  of  the  night 

The  wandering  "  star  "  his  body  found, 
Stretched  in  the  kennel,  beastly  "  tight," 

And  senseless  in  a  trance  profound ; 
He  was  a  dweller  in  the  Tombs 

And  from  that  prison  when  exempt, 
He  sought  relief  from  self-contempt, 
In  brandy's  soul-confusing  fumes. 

He  only  said,  "  It  is  the  tipple, 

The  tipple  'tis,"  he  said ; 
He  murmured,  "  Go  it  like  a  cripple. 
And  go  it  'till  you  're  dead  !" 


213 


And  ever  as  the  lamp  grew  dim, 

And  brandy  lay  beyond  his  reach, 
He  saw  pale  spectres  glare  at  him, 
And  mutter  fiercely  each  to  each. 
0,  they  were  hours  to  freeze  the  soul, 
When  those  blue  corpses  o'er  him  bent— 
And,  to  convey  the  moral  meant, 
Each  fiend  upheld  a  glittering  bowl. 

He  only  said,  "  It  is  the  tipple, 

The  tipple  'tis,"  he  said ; 
He  murmured,  "  Go  it  like  a  cripple, 
And  go  it  'till  you  're  dead!  " 

There  is,  within  some  granite  walls, 
A  high  and  hideous  wooden  thing, 
And  in  its  floor  a  door  that  falls, 

Obedient  to  a  secret  spring. 
Aye  ;  groan  and  shriek  !  With  cries  and  tears, 
Mercy  of  earth  and  heaven  demand ; 
A  wife's  red  blood  is  on  your  hand — 
Your  kindest  gift  to  her  for  years ! 

So  ends  the  ballad  of  the  tipple, 

Be  warned,  and  pray  and  think ; 
The  tap  is  mother  Murder's  nipple, 
You  suck  blood  as  you  drink  ! 


214 


A  PALPABLE  PARODY. 

'Tis  the  last  golden  dollar, 

Left  shining  alone ; 
All  its  brilliant  companions 

Are  squandered  and  gone. 
No  coin  of  its  mintage 

Reflects  back  its  hue — 
They  went  in  mint-juleps, 

And  this  will  go  too  ! 

I'll  not  keep  thee,  thou  lone  one, 

Too  long  in  suspense  ; 
Thy  brethren  were  melted, 

And  melt  thou  to  pence  ! 
I  ask  for  no  quarter, 

I'll  spend,  and  not  spare, 
Till  my  old  tattered  pocket 

Lie  centless  and  bare. 

So  soon  may  I  follow 

When  friendships  decay  ; 

And  from  beggary's  last  dollar, 
The  dimes  drop  away  ! 


215 

"When  the  Maine  law  has  passed, 
And  the  groggeries  sink  : 

What  use  would  be  dollars, 
With  nothing  to  drink  ? 


AN  OLFACTORY  ODE  IN  PRAISE  OF 
NEW- YORK  CLEANLINESS. 

Thank  Heaven  !   the  crisis — 

The  terror  is  past, 
And  the  sense  they  call  smelling 

Has  perished  at  last ; 
And  the  anguish  of  smelling 

Has  perished  at  last. 

Sadly  I  know 

Of  one  sense  I'm  forlorn  ; 
But,  with  pleasure  and  profit, 

The  loss  may  be  borne  ; 
With  profit  and  pleasure 

That  loss  may  be  borne. 


216 

And  I  walk  so  composedly, 
Now  through  the  street, 

That  any  beholder 
Might  fancy  my  feet 

Were  treading  on  roses, 
All  fragrant  and  sweet. 

The  stifling  and  choking, 

The  odors  and  stenches, 
Are  quieted  now ; 

The  olfactory  wrenches, 
That  maddened  my  brow, 

Are  gone.    Ah,  those  horrible, 

Horrible  stenches  ! 

The  sickness — the  nausea — 

The  pitiless  pain, 
Have  ceased  with  the  smelling 

That  maddened  my  brain ; 
With  the  smell  of  the  garbage 

That  rose  to  my  brain. 

And,  oh  !  of  all  odors, 
That  odor  the  worst — 

The  odor  commingled 
Of  cabbage  accursed ; 


217 

The  odors  of  fish, 

And  of  cabbage  accursed  ; 
That  torture  no  more 

In  my  nostril  is  nursed. 

And,  ah  !   let  it  never 

Be  foolishly  said, 
That  I  am  regretting 

The  cold  in  my  head  ; 
The  cold  whence  the  numbness 

Of  smelling  is  bred  1 

For  now,  all  unheeding 

Olfactory  wrenches, 
I  care  not  for  Gotham — 

Its  complicate  stenches, 
Its  quintuple  odors 

Of  cumulent  stenches — 
Its  fish,  flesh  and  blood 

And  its  cabbage-stalk  stenches. 

And  now  I  walk  happily ; 

Fearless  of  any 
Diversified  odors — 

Although  there  are  many  ; 
For  my  nostril  is  choked, 

And  I  care  not  for  any. 


218 

And  happy  am  I  with 

A  cold  in  my  head ! 
The  dank  exhalation 

From  garbage-heaps  bred- 
The  sewerage  and  filth, 

Upon  which  hogs  are  fed- 
Never  trouble  me,  blest 

With  a  cold  in  my  head. 


RIME  OF  YE  SEEDIE  PRINTEERE  MAN, 

It  is  a  seedie  printeere  man, 
And  he  stoppeth  one  of  three — 

"  By  thy  unshorn  beard  and  fevered  eye 
Now  wherefore  stopp'st  thou  me  ?" 

"  For  Jullien's  band  doth  play  to-night, 

And  I  must  hence  away ; 
The  fiddles  they  are  deftly  tuned, 

Dost  hear  Herr  Koenig  play  ?" 


219 

He  holds  him  with  his  grimy  hand, 

"  More  copy  !"  he  doth  cry; 
"  Hold  off,  thou  grisly  printeere  man  !" 

The  victim  makes  reply. 

He  holds  him  with  his  fevered  eye, 
"  More  copy  !  it  must  come ; 

My  printeeres  they  are  standing  still" — 
The  editeere  is  dumb. 

The  editeere  he  sat  him  down, 
His  teares  they  quickly  ran, 

While  thus  spake  on  the  seedie  one, 
The  red-eyed  printeere  man  : 

"  The  papeeres  must  to-morrow  out ; 

To-morrow  be  on  hand, 
And  you  are  our  chief  editeere — 

More  copy  we  demand!" 

"  The  Times  comes  out  at  early  dawn, 

The  Tribune  follows  soon, 
The  Mirror,  Post,  and  the  Express, 

They  will  be  out  by  noon." 
The  editeere  let  fall  a  tear 

As  he  heard  the  loud  bassoon. 


220 

Lo !  Jullien  to  the  dais  mounts, 

A  bearded  wight  is  he ; 
With  bugle-blow  before  him  go 

The  merrie  minstrelsy. 

But  still  the  steadfast  printeere  man 
"  More  copy  !"  cries  aloud — 

Ye  broken-hearted  editeere 

Withdraws  him  from  the  crowd. 

"  God  save  thee,  wretched  editeere  ! 
What  '  devils'  plague  thee  thus  ?" 

He  ground  an  answer  through  his  teeth- 
It  sounded  like  a  cuss. 

All  night  that  wretched  editeere 

Before  his  desk  did  sit ; 
In  vain  for  him  had  Mr.  Brough 

A  free  admission  writ. 

"  More  copy  !"  still  the  "  devils"  cry, 
He  cannot  choose  but  make  it ; 

And  when  his  weary  task  is  done, 
He  bids  the  "  devil"  take  it ! 


221 

Next  morning  when  the  sheet  appeared, 

The  public  laughed  amain  ; 
They  little  thought  the  little  jokes 

Had  cost  such  mickle  pain. 

He  wrote  like  one  that  had  been  dunned 

For  copy,  all  forlorn ; 
A  less  harmonious  Democrat 

He  rose  the  morrow  morn. 


A  TEMPERANCE  PARODY. 


The  grogshop  stood  open  before  me, 

Where  late  I  had  squandered  my  tin, 
But  I  staggered,  and  something  came  o'er  me, 

Which  said  it  was  vain,  to  go  in. 
'Tis  true  I  had  spent  my  last  quarter 

With  friends — Tommy  Sludge  and  Ned  Dix 
But  what  are  such  "  bricks  "  without  mortar  ? 

And  cash  is  the  mortar  of  "  bricks." 


222 


n. 

I  flew  to  the  counter — the  bar-maid 

Looked  blue  when  I  asked  her  to  trust ; 
And  I  said,  "Now  (hie)  don't  be  alarmed, 

I  want  (hie)  to  moisten  my  dust. 
There  lies  (hie)  the  flask  that  can  soften 

My  pains,  were  I  in  (hie)  death's  jaws  ; 
But  why  does  the  hand  that  (hie)  often — 

Why  now  does  that  fair  hand  (hie)  pause  ?" 

in. 

There  was  a  time,  falsest  (hie)  bar-maid, 

I  loved  you  (hie)  more  than  enough ; 
When  the  brandy,  I  thought,  was  (hie)  charmed, 

Because  you  (hie)  poured  out  the  stuff. 
But  now,  (hie)  thou  pimpled-faced  daughter 

Of  gin,  (hie)  how  stained  is  thy  glass  ! 
And  I'm — (hie)  if  I  don't  take  to  water, 

And  vote  (hie)  the  Maine  law  to  pass. 

IV. 

Already  the  groggeries  are  reeling, 

The  reign  of  the  rum-fiend  is  o'er, 
And  law,  a  new  feature  revealing, 

Restrains  where  it  punished  before. 


223 

Then  vote  the  Maine  ticket  we  "  oughter," 
Preach,  write  for  it — never  be  dumb ; 

On  our  side  is  virtue  and  water, 
On  theirs  is  delirium  and  rum ! 


THE  LOST  CITY  BROOM. 


Our  tongues  they  were  swollen  and  frothy ; 

For  the  dust  it  was  blinding  and  thick — 

The  dust  it  was  choking  and  thick  ; 
And  the  hearts  in  our  bosoms  grew  wrathy, 

And  the  blood  in  our  pulses  ran  quick ; 
Our  garments  were  dusted  and  mothy, 

As  if  they  were  powdered  with  brick — 
And  with  garments  all  dusted  and  mothy 

It  is  hard  to  appear  "  like  a  brick  !" 

n. 

Here  once,  in  a  coat  of  the  newest, 
And  pants  inexpressive  I  walked — 
In  pants  that  did  shine  as  I  walked 


224 


They  were  days  when  ray  tailor  was  truest, 

And  heard  all  the  vows  that  I  talked ; 

All  the  vows  that  I  recklessly  talked  : 
And  still  when  my  prospects  were  bluest. 

To  give  me  long  tick,  he  ne'er  balked — 
Though  my  prospects  were  bankrupt  and  bluest, 

That  tailor  at  tick  never  balked. 

in. 

Our  fancies  were  noosed  in  a  lasso, 
Our  fancies  were  strangled  and  slain, 
Dirt-stifled,  and  throttled,  and  slain; 

And  we  cried,  both  in  tenor  and  basso, 
For  gravel,  for  dust-carts  and  rain — 
(Ah  !  globules  of  exquisite  rain  !) 

We  knew  not  the  fair  street  of  Nassau, 
(Though  here  we  have  lived  and  remain,) 

Remembered  not  the  good  street  of  Nassau, 
In  our  thirst  for  the  brow-cooling  rain  ! 

IV. 

And  now — while  the  whirling  wind  tosses 
The  dust  in  the  air  like  a  fog — 
Like  a  foul  and  most  palpable  fog ; 

What  vision  my  aching  eye  crosses, 


And  gives  mv  dull  fancy  a  jog — 

A  genial  and  generous  jog  ? 
An  Alderman's  ruby  proboscis, 

Begemmed  with  its  blossoms  of  grog — 
A  flame-colored,  fiery  proboscis. 

Distilled  from  quintessence  of  grog  ! 

v. 

And  I  said  —  "  It  is  redder  than  copper; 

It  stands  like  a  flame  'twixt  his  eyes  — 

'Twixt  his  cunning  and  black-beaded  eyes 
He  has  seen  that  the  dust  is  a  stopper 

On  mouths  that  were  uttering  cries  — 

(Yea !  anti-bad- Alderman  cries  !) 
And  he  comes  now  to  tell  me  a  whopper, 

A  pack  and  a  bundle  of  lies  — 

A  bundle  of  infamous  lies ; 
That,  although  like  the  flour  from  a  hopper, 

The  dust  from  the  dirty  street  flies, 
Still  he  has  done  all  that  is  proper 

To  save  our  unfortunate  eyes  1" 


But  the  nose  it  burned  redder  and  gayer. 

That  nose  in  my  face  he  did  thrust ; 
That  flesh-case  of  rum  he  did  thrust : 


226 

And  he  said,  "  Do  you  seek  an  allayer 

To  conquer  this  delicate  dust  ? 
Bo  you,  Oh  unhappy  tax-payer  ! 

Dislike  to  be  smothered  in  dust  ?" 
And  he  laughed,  and  his  red  nose  grew  gayer  - 

He  laughed  'till  I  thought  he  would  burst, 
While  my  hair  stood  on  end  and  grew  grayer, 

At  the  prospect  of  dying  in  dust  — 

Of  deplorably  dying  in  dust ! 

VII. 

I  replied  —  "  It  is  surely  not  pleasant  ; 

Not  pleasant,  as  every  one  knows, 

As  every  bedusted  one  knows ; 
For  the  waste  of  Sahara,  at  present, 

O'er  which  the  sirocco  wind  blows  — 

(Raising  billows  of  sand  as  it  blows  !) 
That  waste,  now  so  anti-liquescent 

Has  witnessed  no  dustfuller  throes, 
Than  we,  in  square,  alley,  and  crescent, 

In  streets,  and  in  lanes,  and  in  rows, 
Are  called  to  endure,  and  look  pleasant ; 

But  you  —  (ah  !  my  God,  how  it  glows  !) 
Come  up  from  the  City  Hall  crescent, 

With  rum  in  your  luminous  nose  ! 


227 


VIII. 

Thus  I  soothed  the  great  man  alder  manic, 

And  tempted  him  out  of  his  gloom  — 

His  fiery,  sarcastical  gloom; 
And  (though  still  his  proboscis  volcanic 

The  dust-darkened  air  did  illume, 
And  gleamed  like  the  peak  of  Mount  Yaanek  — 

A  rose  of  perpetual  bloom  !) 
He  led  me  along  with  titanic 

And  muscular  strength,  'till  a  tomb 
Impeded  his  progress  titanic  — 

A  dusty  and  legended  tomb  : 
And  I  cried,  "  Will  thine  eyes  aldermanic 

Declare  what  is  writ  on  this  tomb  ?" 
He  replied — "  'Tis  the  broom  !  'tis  the  broom  ! 
'Tis  the  grave  of  the  lost  city  broom !" 


IX. 

Then  my  tongue  it  grew  swollen  and  frothy, 
For  the  dust  it  was  hideously  thick  — 
The  dust  it  was  stifling  and  thick  ; 

And  the  heart  in  my  bosom  grew  wrathy, 
And  the  blood  in  my  pulses  ran  quick — 


The  blood  it  leaped  wildly  and  quick ; 
For  the  tomb  it  was  dusted  and  mothy, 

A  tomb  of  derision-proof  brick  — 
And  with  right  arm,  determined  and  wrathy, 

I  seized  an  immaculate  stick  — 

A  long,  heavy,  iron-shod  stick ; 
But  the  copper-nose,  flaccid  and  frothy, 

Vamosed  and  evanished  so  quick, 

That  he  felt  not  the  weight  of  my  stick  — 

Of  my  long,  heavy,  skull-cracking  stick. 


EPIGEAM. 

[To  a  young  lady  who  asked  "  The  Letter  H."  for  his  name  in  her  album.] 

You  ask  for  my  name  !    ah,  dear  madam,  you  palter 
With  the  hopes  I  have  felt,  as  you  well  understand. 

If  you  wish  for  my  name,  it  is  yours  at  the  altar : 
I'll  give  you  my  name  when  you  give  me  your  hand. 


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LIBRARY,  UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA,  DAVIS 

Book  Slip-70m-9,'65(F7151s4)45i 


N°  413885 

PS178I* 

Halpine,  C.G.  H2 

Lyrics  by  the  letter    L8 
H  tpseud. j 


LIBRARY 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 
DAVIS 


